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German ruling declares Google liable for false answers in AI Overviews

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Re: German ruling declares Google liable for false answers in AI Overviews

#121

Post by ElProlactin »

TalkingCodeMonk wrote: post #79
MichaelZuo wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nearly the entire American tech industry has been super heavily selected for people who undervalue the legal language with crazy implications buried everywhere. Otherwise most of it would not even exist. Everyone would have continued paying out the nose to the IBM’s of the world year after year (who had unusual willingness to sign short ambiguously worded custom contracts to their own disadvantage, if paid vast amoun…

That is a false dichotomy. The solution to failed laws and regulations is not crime and corruption. The solution is to hold the policial and business leadership accountable; to fix the laws and regulations. The entire American tech industry has exported Americas predatory, parasitic, and unethical consumer laws (the majority of which are ghost written by the wealthy and corporate legal teams). When I studied law in s…

> I feel like a 1950's traditional conservative when I suggest that...

I wouldn't argue that America's moral standards haven't declined (significantly) but I also think it's a romanization to suggest that 1950s America was the pinnacle of morality.

Lying, misleading, and exploiting people for financial gain has been a part of the fabric of American society since the country was founded.

If we're being honest, humans everywhere have demonstrated a high capacity for this behavior since the dawn of civilization.

Re: German ruling declares Google liable for false answers in AI Overviews

#122

Post by chias »

andrewmutz wrote: post #101
Swizec wrote: post #18

Good. The true mark of AGI is when a company accepts liability and doesn’t bury “for entertainment purposes only” deep in their TOS. Same as it works with employees. Same for self-driving. Your car is not self-driving until it accepts liability and you count as just a passenger. But watch as Germany soon loses AI Google results.

I think it's a completely reasonable position that companies making self-driving cars and question/answer systems are legally liable for any errors. But if you hold that position, you also have to be fine with companies not offering products and services in your country. AI systems will eventually be good enough (in 10-20 years) for companies to be able to deploy such systems with sufficient accuracy to afford the la…

Sounds like a win win to me

Re: German ruling declares Google liable for false answers in AI Overviews

#123

Post by thisisit »

heathrow83829 wrote: post #63
Swizec wrote: post #18

Good. The true mark of AGI is when a company accepts liability and doesn’t bury “for entertainment purposes only” deep in their TOS. Same as it works with employees. Same for self-driving. Your car is not self-driving until it accepts liability and you count as just a passenger. But watch as Germany soon loses AI Google results.

at the scale that google is at, it doesn't make an ounce of sense to hold a company liable for a potential mistruth. what if there's a 1/1000 chance of some error, then the company could be sued millions of times per day. down vote all you want, but I firmly believe this is an example where the user needs to use some judgement on the information they receive and have some critical thinking skills. google would be rig…

Google can be reasonably expected to not push pirated content to top if someone is searching for the “big hit music download” because they might be held liable for helping people with illegal downloads. But they shouldn’t be liable for misleading people? Being sued for billions of dollars by corporations vs millions by common folks is the difference

Re: German ruling declares Google liable for false answers in AI Overviews

#124

Post by NegativeK »

clear-octopus wrote: post #51
cmiles8 wrote: post #26

Companies generally are liable if their product doesn’t perform. No reason AI should be any different.

That’s not very typical in software. Especially software you don’t pay for (with money)

That's apparently already changing in the EU, where software vulnerabilities mean the company is liable for damages. The only way out is to straight up not make any money (not just from direct sales) from the software.

Re: German ruling declares Google liable for false answers in AI Overviews

#125

Post by themafia »

Swizec wrote: post #18

Good. The true mark of AGI is when a company accepts liability and doesn’t bury “for entertainment purposes only” deep in their TOS. Same as it works with employees. Same for self-driving. Your car is not self-driving until it accepts liability and you count as just a passenger. But watch as Germany soon loses AI Google results.

> But watch as Germany soon loses AI Google results.

Time to set my VPN location to Germany. I'm tired of the "udm" trick.

Re: German ruling declares Google liable for false answers in AI Overviews

#126

Post by tjpnz »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #46
tjpnz wrote: post #29

Does this extend to ads displayed in search results? Because they absolutely should be liable for the scams they advertise also.

> Does this extend to ads displayed in search results? Probably not, for the same reason search results aren't an issue.

Search engines have that exemption for results because they don't control the content of the sites they index. That's not the same for ads - Google can and should have more stringent review and KYC processes - but it seems they choose not to.

Re: German ruling declares Google liable for false answers in AI Overviews

#127

Post by themafia »

Robotbeat wrote: post #108
Frieren wrote: post #81

How could anything else make any sense? Platforms are getting used to provide dangerous broken products and get away with it. There should be some limit to it. Next do Amazon that is selling AI generated foraging books: - https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2023/sep/01/mushroom-... When I was a kid it was possible to buy any foraging books from a store and they had a minimum quality. Is that so difficult to achiev…

Should we hold scientists and journalists liable if they say false things or misrepresent things?

If they do so knowingly, and harm is caused, then yes. Are you suggesting we should give them a pass from years of acquired jurisprudence simply because they hold a particular title?

And what institution gives out the licenses for journalists and scientists? Is it revokable?

Re: German ruling declares Google liable for false answers in AI Overviews

#128

Post by cwnyth »

themafia wrote: post #125
Swizec wrote: post #18

Good. The true mark of AGI is when a company accepts liability and doesn’t bury “for entertainment purposes only” deep in their TOS. Same as it works with employees. Same for self-driving. Your car is not self-driving until it accepts liability and you count as just a passenger. But watch as Germany soon loses AI Google results.

> But watch as Germany soon loses AI Google results. Time to set my VPN location to Germany. I'm tired of the "udm" trick.

Yeah, I fail to see a down side to this. Those overviews are less than worthless to me.

Re: German ruling declares Google liable for false answers in AI Overviews

#129

Post by themafia »

why_at wrote: post #58

I agree with the ruling, but this makes me wonder if it will be possible to have any AI agent at all if it's consistently applied. After all, if I can get ChatGPT or Claude to say something false that should count too, right?

If you give a language model, empowered through an agent, the ability to publish information on your behalf, and it publishes false information which causes either direct or even indirect harm, and you fail to correct it, then yes.. by every conceivable definition already in law.. you are a criminal.

If you knew this was all possible and you did it anyways for personal gain then you are additionally negligent which may add aggravation to your charges.

Re: German ruling declares Google liable for false answers in AI Overviews

#130

Post by ApolloFortyNine »

Unless the courts here made the ruling incredibly narrow somehow (only referencing search engines maybe?), how does this not just ban AI in Germany overnight?

Every AI model can make something up sometimes. Over millions of daily calls, it's essentially impossible for the technology to be guaranteed correct 100% of the time.

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