It has been a great honour to represent Australia on the Expert Advisory Panel for the International AI Safety Report, led by Joshua Bengio and backed by over 30 countries and international organisations including the EU, OECD and UN. This is the most important ongoing effort to monitor AI capability gains and safety risks of…
𝗥𝗶𝘀𝗸-𝗯𝗮𝘀𝗲𝗱 𝗔𝗜 𝗽𝗼𝗹𝗶𝗰𝘆/𝗿𝗲𝗴𝘂𝗹𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝘀𝗼𝘂𝗻𝗱𝘀 𝗼𝗯𝘃𝗶𝗼𝘂𝘀. 𝗕𝘂𝘁 𝗶𝘁 𝗿𝗲𝘀𝘁𝘀 𝗮 𝗳𝗿𝗮𝗴𝗶𝗹𝗲 𝗮𝘀𝘀𝘂𝗺𝗽𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻: 𝘁𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝘄𝗲 𝗰𝗮𝗻 𝗮𝗰𝘁𝘂𝗮𝗹𝗹𝘆 𝗺𝗲𝗮𝘀𝘂𝗿𝗲 𝗿𝗶𝘀𝗸.Yet risk assessment is often put forward as the first thing to answer, as if it’s the easy part. Some frameworks push “use case–based” solutions with a pre-defined list of high-risk use cases, but then smuggle in the magic…
𝗪𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝗶𝗳 𝘄𝗲’𝘃𝗲 𝗯𝗲𝗲𝗻 𝗰𝗮𝘁𝗲𝗴𝗼𝗿𝗶𝘀𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗚𝗲𝗻𝗲𝗿𝗮𝗹 𝗣𝘂𝗿𝗽𝗼𝘀𝗲 𝗔𝗜 (𝗚𝗣𝗔𝗜) 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝘄𝗿𝗼𝗻𝗴 𝘄𝗮𝘆?• What if it isn’t just another “general-purpose technology” like computing, but a bundle of many specific-purpose technologies out-of-the-box?• And what if calling AI a “capital investment” is also a category error—when in reality it behaves more like inexpensive labour? Yesterday at the Cost-Benefit…
New paper alert (working draft)! “When you really understand what AI is doing, it’s no longer AI — it’s just boring automation.” That old AI community joke captures the paradox of human oversight. We trust calculators and complex business process engines with millions of if–else rules, running hundreds of steps, responding to environmental changes, and…
After my slightly controversial talk on 𝗥𝗲𝗮𝗱𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗶𝗻 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗔𝗴𝗲 𝗼𝗳 𝗔𝗜, I delivered another talk at APS Learn series on 𝗪𝗿𝗶𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗶𝗻 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗔𝗴𝗲 𝗼𝗳 𝗔𝗜. 𝗠𝘆 𝗰𝗼𝗿𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗲𝘀𝗶𝘀: 𝘄𝗿𝗶𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗶𝘀 𝘁𝗵𝗶𝗻𝗸𝗶𝗻𝗴. We write first for self-understanding, then for audience understanding. AI cannot replace that understanding, but it can be a strong discussion partner.…
Just sat down with the latest episode of The Institutional Edge: Real allocators. Real alpha. — and this one hits right at the crossroads of technology, investing, and sustainability. Angelo Calvello speaks with me about why AI’s ESG impact is so hard to measure and what investors can realistically do about it. We dig into…
I never imagined I would one day share a speaking session — and a speaker room chat — with the 𝗹𝗲𝗴𝗲𝗻𝗱𝗮𝗿𝘆 𝗔𝘂𝘀𝘁𝗿𝗮𝗹𝗶𝗮𝗻 𝗰𝗿𝗶𝗰𝗸𝗲𝘁 𝗰𝗮𝗽𝘁𝗮𝗶𝗻 𝗦𝘁𝗲𝘃𝗲 𝗪𝗮𝘂𝗴𝗵. Thanks to the Zoho event in Sydney, that happened. Speaking right after Hugh Watson Australia’s Ambassador for Cyber Affairs and Critical Technology also added a valuable global perspective to…
I was glad to join the 𝗪𝗲𝘀𝘁𝗲𝗿𝗻 𝗔𝘂𝘀𝘁𝗿𝗮𝗹𝗶𝗮𝗻 𝗚𝗼𝘃𝗲𝗿𝗻𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁’𝘀 𝗜𝗻𝗻𝗼𝘃𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗪𝗲𝗲𝗸, contributing to discussions on both AI and cyber. The event was buzzing with energy, sharp questions, and concrete use cases being shared. On cybersecurity, my key messages were:1. You don’t need to copy-share data everywhere—doing so only increases the attack surface. Analytics and compute…
CSIRO’s Data61 latest research gives copyright owners and data producers a new superpower — the option to make their sensitive and sovereign data 𝘂𝗻𝗹𝗲𝗮𝗿𝗻𝗮𝗯𝗹𝗲 by AI. It’s been getting some attention, with us appearing on ABC TV, 7 News, and 2GB radio to explain the technology. Unlike past “confuse the AI” tricks like data poisoning,…
🏆Our paper — “Toward Responsible AI in the Era of Generative AI: A Reference Architecture for Designing Foundation Model-Based Systems” has been awarded the Best Paper Award of IEEE Software 2024! https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/stamp/stamp.jsp?arnumber=10553223 Although CSIRO’s Data61 often publish breakthrough research and win best paper awards at academic conferences, nothing beats being recognised by practitioners. The world-leading…
Dr Liming Zhu FTSE
Research Director, CSIRO
Conjoint Professor, CSE UNSW
For other roles, see LinkedIn & Professional activities.
If you’d like to invite me to give a talk, please see here & email liming.zhu@csiro.au