AI Threats
What happens when artificial intelligence isn't just in your pocket—but potentially in your courtroom, your economy, and your national security strategy? In this gripping episode, we dive into The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly of AI with national security expert Asha Castleberry-Hernandez—a former Biden-Harris appointee, Army veteran, and foreign policy strategist. Is AI our greatest tool—or our biggest threat? From surveillance concerns and job displacement to government regulation and international power plays, we unpack it all.
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AI Threats
AI - The Good, Bad, And Ugly With Asha Castleberry-Hernandez
We have a very serious episode about AI: the good, bad, and the ugly. Our expert is Asha Castleberry-Hernandez, who is first US National Security Expert and Foreign Policy Executive. She's a strategist, author, former Biden Harris political appointee, army veteran, and academic professor.
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Asha, welcome to the show. We're going to pick your brain about the good, bad, and ugly of AI. That should get you going. Let me ask one question. Please tell us in your experience how you even got involved with AI or how you learned about it and what it looks like in the government.
AI As A National Security Concern
Thank you so much for allowing me to join this wonderful program. I enjoyed my time discussing the future of US-China relations. As far as looking at that relationship, a lot of it has to do with competition and adversarial behavior, especially when it comes to two domains, economics and technology. As a national security practitioner, it's extremely important to me that I monitor emerging threats or emerging industries like artificial intelligence and find out ways on how does the American people adapt to this emerging industry.
That's a lot of information when it comes to artificial intelligence. A variation of different sub topics and what you're seeing not just in United States but in the world where everybody's trying to get a good handle of what exactly we need to do as far as dealing with artificial intelligence. There are different approaches. Some of it involves cooperating with it. It's actually beneficial when it comes to our careers or just our way of life in the 21st century.
Some of it deals with competition, where when it comes to R&D as well as dealing with machine systems that we are trying to advance in society, how do we compete against our near competitors in that aspect and other countries as well. Some of it is adversarial or threatening to us. How do we stop the machine systems from taking over us? How do we stop the foreign actors from using it against us? There's a lot of figuring out happening here. It's not just necessarily where we have to work with the world. There's a big push where the public and private sector have to work together in order to figure these approaches out.
How does that work into threats as you see it? I would call this episode a good, bad, and the ugly on purpose. How do you see AI within your world operating as a threat?
When you look at human behavior or human consumption when it comes to technology, unfortunately, there's a side of us where we will allow it to take over us. There was a lot of studies, reports, and assessments that there's a possibility of that. What you start to see, especially coming from government is, how can we better regulate artificial intelligence from preventing that from happening?
What are ways we could do to work very closely with the private sector as far as like dealing with law, habits, and all sorts of strategies that we need to come together as far as addressing that particular issue. It sounds silly but it's something that is ongoing terms of how can we prevent the machine taking over us. What's interesting is, I'm an 80s-90s kid, so I grew up, we watch a lot of Arnold Schwarzenegger and movies like Total Recall and Terminators. It reminds you of that of do we have to one day fight the machine because the machine much took over us or wants to take over society.
That's a real concept that many policy makers and the private sector is trying to prevent. There are some policymakers that believe that the private sector doesn't mind that. That's the extreme look of it, but that's one way in terms of a potential threat that when you characterize it is, how can we better regulate the behavior of artificial intelligence to where it's not threatening to us.
Is that a government thing where the government's looking for ways to regulate that from your experience?
AI Misuse By Foreign Governments
Yes. They have to work with the private sector in doing so but they also have to work with our foreign actors as far as addressing this issue. Here's the other side of it where it can be threatened too as well, and we've seen plenty of examples of this in the 21st century. When you look at for instance, our near peer competitor, the PRC. They have an issue when it comes to practices that we don't agree on like a lack of transparency, accountability, and collection on people. They could use that information against them.
A perfect examples to explain that behavior as for instance, the Chinese, at one point were selling surveillance systems around the world. There's one country in Central America that bought those surveillance systems. What they've noticed over time, those surveillance systems are collecting data on people. The PRC was utilized that data against the government, against the people in that specific country.
As a result, that specific country banded those PR systems and also condemned what China was doing in terms of utilizing those systems. That story alone, many people try to speak to Israel about the same thing saying, "Do not buy these surveillance systems from the PRC because there's been a lot of accusations out there that they utilize those systems to collect data on the people and other sensitive areas," like what we talked about with the balloon, the situation in drones.
AI might be used in lawsuits and in that thing making legal policy. There's been some stuff out there that AI is capable of lying or misinformation. Have you experienced any of that in terms of what they're trying to lay down policy or anything in the government?
Bias, Misinformation, & Legal Ramifications Of AI
Yes. There's been some accusations or just some major implications involving as they're collecting data. The data that they collect tends to be discriminatory based on the algorithms and has created legal issues or cases as a result of that behavior. That's the threatening part, too. Another extreme version of this, artificial intelligence is also considered threatening in terms of outsourcing or providing jobs to machines. Looking at the fact that in the future, instead of having a judge as a human, we can have AI play as a judge or act like a judge.
People are thinking ahead. There's a lot of assessments that encounter that potential approach saying that there's no way because they don't have the cognitive human development to have or to create a good judgment on legal cases. There are some legal implementations evolving artificial intelligence as of now, but also looking at the future approach of it taking over being a judge in a courtroom.
You have that immediate access to all the data that's out there. The question is, if they're not human, could they evaluate it in the right way? Somebody just doesn't get hung for something they didn't do because it's just black and white instead of any gray in the deal. Do you see the government at your level using any particular AI platforms?
Government Adoption & Public Adaptation To AI
Here's the good side about it. It's inevitable that everyone's going to use it and they are using it now. You have for instance as small as virtual chat rooms or virtual assistants. You also have these apps where you can utilize it for writing skills or creating reports. At times, you'll see especially in government, do not use those apps or use those machine systems because they're not credible. We can tell that you did not write it, but you see it evolves to where, "You can use it but be careful."
It reminds me of a cryptocurrency where in the beginning, "No, you cannot. It's a toxic industry." The evolution of is where you can see as we're adapted to it, we're no longer saying no more but, "You can use it but be careful. Here's this is. This is how you can better safeguard yourself from these systems or these practices online."
You are seeing where AI is becoming more of a useful tool. In fact, the government is pushing for more the American people to be part of the innovation aspect of it so that we can be able to compete against China when it comes to developing your future AI tools. It's like a love-hate relationship, where you have to be careful. It could be threatening, but we are cooperating with it at the same time.
You have to be careful when using AI. It can be threatening, but we are also cooperating with it.
Have you heard of the central digital bank?
Yes, I have.
Supposedly, the last administration that you were in, they were trying to push that as a latest currency that people could be straight on digital currency away from the dollars, as we understand it. Did that run through the pipes over there?
I did hear speculation about as far as accepting the concept and looking forward to creating a digital bank. It tells you that we can no longer completely reject it. We have to learn how to adapt to it. It's becoming more of a bipartisan consensus among policymakers in the rest of the government that we should have a digital bank. You're seeing under the current administration where they're pushing for this. That's why I bought a cryptocurrency because cryptocurrency intersect well with the artificial intelligence industry. Lots to it, but we're moving away from we can no longer utilize these AI tools or cryptocurrencies. It's not happening.
If you follow that, we could do a whole episode about that money deal and what's happening on it because there's a thing in Christian Community called the great reset. Are you familiar with it?
I'm somewhat familiar with it.
Basically, at some point people will not own anything and they'll be happy about it, which is a train wreck getting ready to happen. Only because you know what we like to do, we like to give people what's going on and talk to people like you they're in it and get that information out there then we end up creating an action guide.
Based on everything you've been doing at least the last couple months in this, what would you say to my audience to give them peace about AI other than just paying attention? I use AI for certain things, but I haven't got a clue how it works. I just know that it works. What would you say to this audience about giving them peace when they're looking down the pipe of that becoming a job replacing them or whatever?
AI As A Workforce & Military Tool
First and foremost, the main thing is to educate yourself about artificial intelligence. It's an evolution to it. It's rapidly changing every day. It's very important for the American people to read about it at credible sources. Whether it's like think tanks or like a private company that has the credibility. It doesn't have misinformation and disinformation about AI. That's very important to note. Also, I wouldn't put all my trust into it and I won't completely reject it.
What I'm seeing in meetings, if you see that there's someone in a virtual meeting using a virtual assistant. That's fine. You can use a virtual assistant too as well. Also, looking at the rise of autonomous vehicles or cyber vehicles. That is to a certain extent fine to adapt. If get into cab like Total Recall and you have virtual car driver driving you. That might not be a bad thing in the future. However, that does take a job away from a human.
There is some plus and minuses. I want to look at is it's completely threatening to me. Also, as an American, you want America to lead in this effort when it comes to artificial intelligence because it reminds me of threats that sees no borders. A lot of these online behavioral taskers are coming from everywhere even overseas. You want your children, government, the private sector, and more people involved in this new industry and taking on the leadership worldwide.
As Americans, we can better regulate and set up the standards and norms when it comes to work with other countries so that we could build up a better more safeguarded use of artificial intelligence. For instance, I agree with President Biden during his last United Nations General Assembly. He said, "We are going to have an artificial intelligence advisory group at the UN." I think that's a great idea because it brings all countries together to create standards and norms on how to adapt to AI.
You want more people in government and the private sector involved in this new industry, taking on global leadership. As Americans, we can better regulate and set standards and norms for working with other countries, building a safer and more responsible use of artificial intelligence.
We need that and we need to make sure that we are also exposed to what other countries are learning about AI when it comes to the advancement of these machines systems. That's important to note as far as that because we do have some real competition when it comes to the Chinese, where they're looking at AI tools involving renewable energy, or nuclear energy. It has so many variations to it and we want to make sure we understand the different sub industries or sub topics that fall under AI.
It's very important to keep in mind the evolution of it. It could be overwhelming but for the most part, make sure you know how it applies to you at home when it comes to the use of it. How does it apply to domestically directly? Going back to cryptocurrency using a database like Coinbase. Make sure if you do use that, how do you protect yourself or safeguarding yourself from AI threatening you from collecting your financial information or your private information? Be aware of those tools that can better safeguard you from them collecting from you. There's a lot of information out there about it. The trick is to make sure that it's credible. It's not misinformation or disinformation.
Ethical Leadership & Cross-Sector Collaboration
Do you know if the government is setting up a department for this for people?
Yes.
What's it going to be called?
I don't know yet in terms of an actual agency, but within the agencies. For instance, when I was at the state department. They created a department of cyberspace. A lot of it underscored artificial intelligence as far as working with other countries on how to create norms, standards, and international law when it comes to working on AI. I know there's a lot of new sub departments created within the Department of Defense and Commerce as far as how to deal with artificial intelligence.
Outside of government where you look at like the United Nations or other international organizations. United Nations has UNESCO that helps bring in other countries to come together on how to better safeguard yourself from artificial intelligence. It's a lot of money behind a big push in new departments that are being created but I haven't seen where there's going to be an actual agency focusing on artificial intelligence.
You will let me know first.
Yes.
This is a lot of good information and a lot of to unpack. I'm going to see what all I can get back into this action guide to help people. Again, we're trying to get peace about it. I was trying to find a simple way for them to say, "Where's a clearing house to go out and find out?" I just downloaded a picture. There's something like twenty personal AI programs you can download on your phone to use for every kind of thing.
How do people even know whether it's honest or not? It's just one step at a time just like anything protecting your family. I appreciate you spending the time to do this. I know you're very busy and you got all these events to do. We'll be back in touch with other things. I appreciate you spending your time with us and how you're getting information out because a lot of people are following what you put out about China. It's a big topic. You're a great fun. You had to get together.
Thank you so much.
Have a good day. I appreciate it.