In the midst of the global race for artificial intelligence (AI), Russian President Vladimir Putin denounced on Friday “the monopolistic domination” of Westerners over these new technologies, tools which, according to him, “erase Russian culture”.
“Some Western search engines, so to speak, as well as some generative models, often operate in a very selective and biased manner, and do not take into account, and sometimes even simply ignore and erase Russian culture,” Vladimir Putin said during of an AI forum in Moscow.
“The monopolistic domination of these foreign developments in Russia is unacceptable, dangerous and inadmissible,” he said in sharp criticism.
In recent months, the Russian president has called on his government, major domestic companies and the Russian scientific community to join efforts to develop national programs that can compete with Western artificial intelligence tools such as the American chatbot ChatGPT.
But the launch of its army’s offensive in Ukraine in February 2022 and then the mobilization of hundreds of thousands of reservists the following fall pushed thousands of highly qualified employees in the high technology and IT sectors to leave. abroad, abandoning the national market.
In parallel with the military offensive in Ukraine, Vladimir Putin has in recent years initiated an ultra-conservative cultural shift in Russia, directly opposing the ideals defended in the West.
Faced with the “radical” changes brought about by the arrival of AI in the economy, the Russian head of state on Friday urged Russian companies to “stay at the forefront” of technological advances, despite the delay already accumulated.
A government plan for “a national strategy for the development of AI” will soon be presented, he also announced.
Last April, Sber, one of the Russian leaders in new technologies, launched its own conversational robot, joining the global race for these tools created from AI.
In September, the jewel of Russian tech, Yandex, launched YandexGPT 2, the latest version of its conversational robot.