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Create an IPCC-like body to harness benefits and combat harms of digital tech

Emerging information technologies, including ChatGPT, require proper stewardship. An intergovernmental panel to synthesize the evidence offers the best path forward.
By
  1. Joseph Bak-Coleman

    1. Joseph Bak-Coleman is an associate research scholar at the Craig Newmark Center for Journalism Ethics and Security, School of Journalism, Columbia University, New York City, New York, USA.

  2. Carl T. Bergstrom

    1. Carl T. Bergstrom is professor of biology at the Department of Biology, University of Washington, Seattle, USA.

  3. Jennifer Jacquet

    1. Jennifer Jacquet is an associate professor at the Department of Environmental Studies, New York University, and visiting professor in the Department of Environmental Science and Policy, University of Miami, Florida, USA.

  4. James Mickens

    1. James Mickens is professor of computer science and co-director of the Institute For Rebooting Social Media, Berkman Klein Center, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA.

  5. Zeynep Tufekci

    1. Zeynep Tufekci is a professor of journalism and director of the Craig Newmark Center for Journalism Ethics and Security, School of Journalism, Columbia University, New York City, New York, USA.

  6. Timmons Roberts

    1. Timmons Roberts is professor of environmental studies at the Department of Sociology and the Institute at Brown for Environment and Society, Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island, USA.

Demonstrators holds a inflatable angry emoji during a protest in California.

People protesting against Facebook’s policies hold aloft an inflatable angry emoji outside the firm’s 2019 shareholders meeting in California. Credit: Stephen Lam/Reuters

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Search engines, online banking, social-media platforms and large-language models, such as ChatGPT, are among the many computational systems that offer (or could offer) tremendous benefits. They provide people with unprecedented access to information. They help to connect hundreds of millions of individuals. And they could make all sorts of tasks easier, from writing computer code to preparing scientific manuscripts.

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Nature 617, 462-464 (2023)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-023-01606-9

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Competing Interests

The authors declare no competing interests.

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