OpenAI, Google and Perplexity Near Approval to Host AI Directly for the U.S. Government

Three AI companies—OpenAI, Google and Perplexity—are on the verge of receiving approval to sell their technology, hosted on their own cloud systems, directly to the U.S. government, a person familiar with the matter told Fast Company. That authorization will be on a "low impact" and pilot level, the person said, but constitutes a major step toward independence.

That independence could help those companies avoid some of the complications created by ongoing partnerships between AI firms and longtime government tech contractors. As large language models have gone mainstream, AI companies have often relied on tech firms that have already passed arduous government security reviews—including Microsoft Palantir, and Amazon Web Services—to host their chatbots for federal users. In the early days, these partnerships made it easier for AI labs to quickly get their tech in front of government officials, but it also meant ceding at least some control over when and how their AI was made available.

The downside of that kind of dependence is now playing out in the brewing feud between Anthropic and the Pentagon, which appears to have been fueled, in part, by the company’s partnership with Palantir. The Defense Department is threatening to cancel a $200 million contract after Anthropic requested limits on the use of its AI for certain applications, including autonomous weapons and mass surveillance.

Please select this link to read the complete article from Fast Company.