Tech leaders discuss AI privacy risks and OpenAI luxury commissions

Meredith Whittaker, president of Signal, has raised concerns regarding the intersection of artificial intelligence and user privacy. Speaking at the TechBBQ conference in Copenhagen, Whittaker argued that the current AI boom is driven by a long-standing advertising and surveillance business model. She noted that as AI assistants become deeply integrated into operating systems like Android and iOS, the ability for companies to infer personal behaviors from collected data expands significantly.

In separate industry news, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has commissioned seven custom luxury watches from the Swiss manufacturer Vanguart for himself and members of the company’s leadership team. The titanium timepieces, valued at approximately $180,000 each, feature OpenAI branding and technical engravings, including the Python-style phrase ‘if AGI. aligned: deploy()’ on the caseback.