Anthropic co-founder Jack Clark told the BBC that governments may eventually need to mandate verifiable AI “kill switches” for frontier labs.
Clark said most labs have ways to pull the plug, including Anthropic, but policymakers may need to enforce having one. “Should you mandate for companies to definitely have a killswitch? Is that kill switch verifiable by a third party?” he asked.
Clark argued allowing AI to continue as a “totally unregulated industry” was a bad idea: “We are rolling dice with immense risks.”
US lawmakers have put forward the Kill Switch Act requiring companies to have shutdown capability. The UK government recently rejected creating a kill switch, saying it would not prevent development or misuse elsewhere.
The comments follow CEO Dario Amodei’s call to slow frontier AI development and political pushback from President Trump.