On October 6, 2022, a coalition of general-purpose robotics companies signed an open letter titled “General Purpose Robots Should Not Be Weaponised.” The alliance includes known names from the robotics industry, including Agility Robotics, ANYbotics, Clearpath Robotics, Open Robotics, Unitree Robotics, and the developer of the viral robotics dog that took the internet by surprise in 2020, Boston Dynamics. These companies have led the world by inventing new-age sophisticated mobile robots in the last couple of years. In the open letter, they express their concern about the “possibility of misuse,” including the weaponisation of their technology.
What does the open letter signed by these companies say?
The open letter signed by the companies is available as a press release via Business Wire. As mentioned in the letter, the companies have a consensus that adding weapons to consumer-grade robots that are operated autonomously and are capable of navigating to remote locations “raises new risks of harm and serious ethical issues.” Further, the letter reads, “weaponised applications of these newly-capable robots will also harm public trust in the technology in ways that damage the tremendous benefits they will bring.” Hence, all the companies whose names are mentioned in the beginning have pledged that they won’t weaponise their advanced general-purpose robots or the software that makes their robots come to life.
However, the pledge alone will not be sufficient to mitigate the possibility of widely available robots like Spot. Policymakers and law enforcement authorities will have to work together to “promote the safe use of these robots and to prohibit their misuse.” Reading between the lines, it looks like the companies are trying to defend themselves against the possibility of misuse, but we’ll leave that to the readers to decide. These companies are making advancements in robotics and artificial intelligence, and they are doing it not only for enterprises but for individuals. It has never been easier to get yourself a fully functioning humanoid.
How does robot weaponisation concern us?
We’ve already seen robots working as programmable arms in assembly lines, transporters, and portable dispensing machines; robotics is finding more use cases in several industries, including hospitality and retail. At the same time, there have been several cases of weaponising. In 2021, a company called Ghost Robotics strapped a gun on top of Spot, the robotic dog, making it a lethal war machine with night vision, a range of 1.2km and an optical zoom of up to 30x. Given that Spot’s source code is open, this can also be replicated without supervision.
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