Specifically, the committee recommended that the State Department evaluate whether the distillation attacks violated laws such as the Economic Espionage Act and the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act. They also want “anti-distillation,” a clearly defined and officially managed transfer of technology that would make it easier to limit counterfeit Chinese access to models.
If such steps are taken, the U.S. could pursue bad actors and impose heavy financial penalties that could discourage Chinese firms from seeing “serious violations as a tolerable cost of doing business,” the committee’s report said.
China called the accusations “pure slander”.
Kratsios’ letter threatening retaliation comes ahead of Donald Trump’s expected meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping next month.
Trump claimed that the meeting will be “special” and “a lot will be achieved”. But at least one analyst This was reported to the South China Morning Post The war in Iran means Trump has “almost lost all of his bargaining chips” as the United States and China try to stabilize a trade relationship that has been strained since Trump took office.
China is unlikely to tolerate Kratsios’ claims. Liu Pengyu, a spokesman for China’s embassy in Washington, told the FT that the White House’s accusations were “pure slander”.
“China has always been committed to promoting scientific and technological progress through cooperation and healthy competition,” Pengyu said. “China attaches great importance to the protection of intellectual property rights.”
It remains to be seen whether Trump will side with AI firms who want to see China cut off from their models and sanctioned for its distillation attacks. Trump has been like that in the past He is accused of making huge concessions to China In export control issues, which experts argue threaten US national security and the economy, as US firms argue distillery attacks.
Some Trump concessions may have to be rolled back to combat alleged “industrial espionage.”
Chris McGuire, a technology security expert at the Council on Foreign Relations, told the FT that “Chinese AI firms rely on distillation attacks to overcome deficiencies in AI computing power and illegally reproduce key capabilities of US models.” To stop them, the U.S. may need to tighten export controls that Trump has eased, such as permitting Nvidia chip sales to China subject to US 25 percent cut. The odd deal “made no sense” to experts who warned that Trump’s odd move could open the door for China to demand access to America’s most advanced artificial intelligence chips.
