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Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE:BRK.A)(NYSE:BRK.B) chairman and top boss Warren Buffett on Saturday had some cautious words regarding the potential of artificial intelligence (AI).
Speaking at the conglomerate’s annual shareholder meeting, the veteran investor warned against the role of AI in scamming people and likened the technology to letting a “genie out of a bottle.”
“When you think of the potential for scamming people … If I was interested in investing in scamming, that is gonna be the growth industry of all time and it’s enabled, in a way” by AI, Buffett said.
The “Oracle of Omaha” was referring to AI voice-cloning, facial-cloning and deep-fake technology that scammers use to create or manipulate videos with the purpose of extorting money out of people.
Buffett brought up an example of a recent experience of a fake video featuring himself that made him “nervous.”
“It was me and it was my voice and wearing the kind of clothes I’m wearing and my wife or my daughter wouldn’t have been able to detect any difference and it was delivering a message that no way came from me,” Buffett said.
The famed businessman also said that “we let the genie out of the bottle when we developed nuclear weapons … AI is somewhat similar. Its partway out of the bottle.”
Not all of Buffett’s comments were cautious.
“Obviously AI has potential for good things too,” he said, adding that “I do think, as someone who doesn’t understand a damn thing about it, that it has enormous potential for good and enormous potential for harm.”
Since the release of ChatGPT by OpenAI in November 2022, AI and especially generative AI involving chatbots and conversational tools has become the craze of the technological world.
Companies that make AI chips such as Nvidia (NVDA) and AI servers such as Super Micro Computer (SMCI) have seen stratospheric growth in their market valuations, while players such as Microsoft (MSFT) and Alphabet (GOOG)(GOOGL) are seen as the current leaders of AI.
See here a list of the 10 biggest exchanged-traded funds focused on AI, including the iShares U.S. Technology ETF (IYW) and the Fidelity MSCI Information Technology Index (FTEC).
