Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff said Tuesday that “there has to be some regulation” of artificial intelligence, pointing to several documented cases of suicide linked to the technology.
“This year, you really saw something pretty horrific, which is these AI models became suicide coaches,” Benioff told CNBC’s Sarah Eisen on Tuesday at the World Economic Forum’s flagship conference in Davos, Switzerland.
Benioff’s call for regulation echoed a similar call he made about social media years ago at Davos.
In 2018, Benioff said social media should be treated like a health issue, and said the platforms should be regulated like cigarettes: “They’re addictive, they’re not good for you.”
“Bad things were happening all over the world because social media was fully unregulated,” he said Tuesday, “and now you’re kind of seeing that play out again with artificial intelligence.”
AI regulation in the U.S. has, so far, lacked clarity, and in the absence of comprehensive guardrails, states have begun instituting their own rules, with California and New York enacting some of the most stringent laws.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a series of bills in October to address child safety concerns about AI and social media. New York Gov. Kathy Hochul signed the Responsible AI Safety and Education Act into law in December, imposing safety and transparency regulations on large AI developers.
President Donald Trump has pushed back on what he called “excessive State regulation” and signed an executive order in December to try to block such efforts.
“To win, United States AI companies must be free to innovate without cumbersome regulation,” the order said.
Benioff was adamant Tuesday that a change in AI regulation is necessary.
“It’s funny, tech companies, they hate regulation. They hate it, except for one. They love Section 230, which basically says they’re not responsible,” Benioff said. “So if this large language model coaches this child into suicide, they’re not responsible because of Section 230. That’s probably something that needs to get reshaped, shifted, changed.”
Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act protects technology companies from legal liability over users’ content. Republicans and Democrats have both voiced concerns about the law.
“There’s a lot of families that, unfortunately, have suffered this year, and I don’t think they had to,” Benioff said.
If you are having suicidal thoughts or are in distress, contact the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline at 988 for support and assistance from a trained counselor.