Tyrants and the Weaponization of AI

Authoritarian leadership exists throughout the world and there will always be tyrants or groups that want to rise and take control. But today we are seeing something we have never seen before. The rise in AI and its potential use in an authoritarian takeover.

The pattern of an authoritarian takeover hasn’t changed. It always happens through a series of small steps that may seem harmless, but over time the cumulative effect is anything but. What has changed are the tools a tyrant uses to accomplish full and total control - social media and artificial intelligence.

We’ve all seen the downside of social media as it has evolved into some unexpected things like the enhanced need for people to “keep up with the Joneses,” pressure to conform to certain beauty standards, and when these things aren’t possible, an increase in depression - especially among younger generations.

Add to this the introduction of bots that share toxic information, influencing elections, pitting people against each other, essentially overwhelming our ability to differentiate truth from misinformation.

This will continue as reporting bad actors on social media has been left to automated analysis and responses, largely managed by AI. The result? Most complaints, even about the most horrific posts and profiles, are identified as “not violating community standards.” In addition, legislation reducing or eliminating toxicity and the use of bots for destructive purposes is limited and highly ineffective. 

Social media is just one tool. AI is an entirely different animal. 

AI has opened new possibilities and ways of doing things we couldn’t even imagine in the past. But as with any new discovery or innovation (e.g., fire, cars), there are inherent risks. Today’s tyrant knows AI is in its infancy and used mostly as an enhanced search engine - like Google on steroids, quickly aggregating information from different sources. They can use this knowledge to fully take advantage of both social media and AI to accomplish their goals. They don’t have to choose one tool over the other. They can flood social media with their message, knowing AI will recognize the volume of posts and articles and repeat the information back as fact, making the takeover quicker and more difficult to stop. 

Imagine a tyrant uses social media and AI to propose an end to private ownership of agriculture. A similar proposal was introduced by the Soviets in the 1920s and it took 5-6 years to go from a proposal to almost complete implementation - years of propaganda, resistance, and punishment before the takeover was complete. Today, using AI and social media, a tyrant can make a similar proposal and compress the same process of using propaganda and manufactured consensus, silencing and punishing resistance, and completing full implementation in a matter of months. 

The tyrant’s playbook doesn’t change, only the tools may differ. Today, for any of their proposals, they will start small and justify it as a security or economic necessity for the greater good. They can quickly upload a number of repeated posts, articles, and “expert” opinions to accelerate group thinking, knowing many will believe, “If so many people agree with this, maybe it’s ok.” Then each step in the takeover is introduced quicker.

More people buying into the tyrant’s plans help to squelch the resistance. And what happens to those who continue to resist? At first, it is small. A flood of reports will get their post or account suspended. Then it escalates and they can be identified, doxxed, or worse. 

This becomes a trap that the tyrant can count on. The threat of not speaking up strengthens the tyrant’s ability to impose their harmful ideas and speaking up threatens the safety of the individual.

The only solution is for true guardrails and this can only happen if real legislation is put in place to protect citizens. Now is the time for this to happen. 

But until that happens, what can you do? Who can you trust? 

And even further, at what point will the guardrails, created to protect us, end up violating other rights? 

NOTE: The use of the word tyrant does not necessarily discuss the actions of a singe person. A group or governing body can also be tyrannical. As such, this article focuses on process and not on any one particular individual or group.