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From day one, President Biden has made defending democracy at home and around the world a core priority for his administration. In the fight for our democracies in the 21st century, the frontlines are increasingly online.
Around the world, authoritarian regimes are weaponizing technology to censor, surveil, and repress their citizens. Meanwhile, citizens and civil society groups use social media and online messaging to organize, to wield smartphones to document human rights abuses and share them with the entire world.
The United States is committed to ensuring that digital technologies enhance the rights and the privacy of our people and expand broad-based opportunity.
We’re determined to work with fellow democracies to realize that goal. The Freedom Online Coalition is taking steps to curb digital surveillance. We’ve worked to define guardrails for the use of surveillance technologies by governments. We’ve mobilized 17 nations committed to countering the misuse and abuse of commercial spyware.
This coalition is also exchanging lessons on how to expose, disrupt, and deter disinformation. Members are working to build a more resilient global information system and to hold accountable those seeking to undermine democratic elections.
We’re shaping the frameworks and the rules for the responsible development and use of artificial intelligence – technology that will affect the future of freedoms, online and offline.
A few weeks ago, we joined fellow democracies in signing the Council of Europe’s AI Convention – the world’s first multilateral treaty on AI and human rights.
The coalition has released a joint statement on responsible AI practices, spelling out how governments can procure and use artificial intelligence in a way that protects rights, safety, and privacy for citizens. All of us should move swiftly to implement these principles, but also encourage partners to do the same thing.
We can take some pride in the progress that we’ve made, but we cannot let up. Because authoritarian regimes are determined to co-opt and abuse technology to repress their people, we must be equally determined to defend freedom online.
AI Technology Must Be Inclusive
The more inclusive AI is, the more effective it can actually be in tackling the challenges that are affecting people everywhere.
If we’re going to realize the full potential of AI to improve people’s lives around the world, that requires accelerating our efforts to ensure that this technology is genuinely inclusive.
We are seeing remarkable innovations in harnessing AI to expand opportunity. But we have our work cut out for us, because this AI revolution is leaving people behind.
Making this technology more inclusive is not an act of generosity. It’s in our national interest and in the interests of our firms, our entrepreneurs, and our investors.
So one of the things our government is doing is putting out new resources to help our partners use AI in ways that improve lives.
We’re announcing a new public-private partnership with leading AI companies to help expand access and capacity in the places and communities where it’s needed most, especially in developing countries.
 Secretary Blinken announces a new public-private partnership that is committing more than $100 million to making AI more inclusive. (Official State Department photo by Chuck Kennedy)
The State Department will partner with Amazon, Anthropic, Google, IBM, Meta, Microsoft, Nvidia, and OpenAI to expand access to AI. The Partnership for Global Inclusivity on AI will work to close the gap in three crucial areas: compute, capacity, and context, the three Cs of advancing equity through artificial intelligence.
First, on compute, we’re going to expand access to cutting-edge AI models, compute credits, and more open-source tools.
On capacity, we will accelerate training efforts to empower people to use and adapt AI tools.
With context, we’ll work with governments, businesses, civil society organizations, and communities to create localized, context-specific datasets, including for Indigenous cultures and languages.
To catalyze this partnership, I’m also announcing that the Department of State and USAID will spend $33 million in U.S. foreign assistance on AI development, with $10 million focused on expanding access. We’ll work with Congress to provide $23 million for programs that build on our efforts to develop safe, reliable, and trustworthy AI governance frameworks; use AI to advance human rights and development priorities; and promote educational and cultural exchanges on AI-related topics.
Together, we and our private sector partners are committing over $100 million to this effort.
To get the most out of this transformative technology, we have to give more people in more places the chance to adapt it and use it for good. None of us – no country, no community, no particular people – have a monopoly on good ideas, on innovation, on problem solving.
We look forward to continuing this vital work together in the months and years to come. We know, as with virtually everything else we do, when we’re doing it together, when we join forces – and not just among governments but with the private sector, with civil society, and NGOs – there’s nothing we can’t get done, if we share the determination to do it and do it together.
Sincerely,
 Secretary Antony J. Blinken
Note to Readers
This flagship email – “From the Secretary’s Desk” – features the Secretary’s remarks and speeches on important current events. Sign up to receive this email regularly.
This email was adapted from two speeches that I delivered on September 23, 2024, in New York City during the 79th session of the United Nations General Assembly.
Find all my speeches, remarks, and other press statements on State.gov. You can follow me on Twitter, Instagram, and Threads to learn more about my work.
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