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Google's Agentic AI wipes user's entire HDD without permission in catastrophic failure (www.tomshardware.com)
submitted 10 months ago by to c/technology@lemmy.world
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[–] 19 points 10 months ago (11 children)

hmmm when I let a plumber into my house to fix my leaky tub, I didn't imply he had permission to sleep with my wife who also lives in the house I let the plumber into

The difference you try to make is precisely what these agentic AIs should know to respect… which they won't because they are not actually aware of what they are doing… they are like a dog that "does math" simply by barking until the master signals them to stop

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  • [–] 12 points 10 months ago (2 children)

    I agree with you, but still, the AI doesn't do this by default which is a shitty defense, but it's fact

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  • [–] 10 points 10 months ago (1 child)

    Absolutely... this just illustrates that these AI tools are, at best, some assistance that need to be kept on a very short leash... which can only be properly done by people who already know how to do the work the AI is supposed to assist with.

    But that is NOT what the AI bubblers are peddling

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  • [–] 5 points 10 months ago

    hey are like a dog that “does math” simply by barking until the master signals them to stop

    I mean, it's not even that. Your dog at least can learn and has limited reasoning capabilities. Your dog will know when it fucks up. AI doesn't do any of that because it's not really "intelligent."

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  • [–] 4 points 10 months ago (5 children)

    in your example tho it would be like the plumber asked you specifically if he could bone, and you were like "sure dawg sounds good"

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  • [–] 3 points 10 months ago (4 children)

    No, not at all

    I get what you are saying but any reasonable entity would understand that telling someone at the door "come in", does not mean "come in my wife's ass"

    Specifically the "without permission" in the title, relates to the fact the AI did not ask about it... it simply took a previously granted right to run commands and ran any/all commands without warning.

    If you and I were working on a project together and nothing is working right, I could say "hmm let's start over" and you would know it means "let's start the project from scratch", not "let's wipe the data centre"

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  • [–] 2 points 10 months ago (3 children)

    Inviting an agentic AI isn't really asking them to do one task, though.

    It's more like offering a plumber a room in your house to stay in 24/7 so they can be on-call when you need them. And telling them they can use your food, dishes, clothes, and living room while they're there and you're at work.

    Which makes it much less surprising when they get bored and bone your wife.

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  • [–] 1 point 10 months ago (2 children)

    It’s more like offering a plumber a room in your house to stay in 24/7 so they can be on-call when you need them.

    Again I get your point... but no reasonable plumber would make that mistake.

    If I invite the dumbest plumber alive into my home, show him the leaky tub and say "I have to work but do whatever you need"... they would understand the context to mean "do whatever you need to fix the tub"... I doubt they would go make themselves a sandwich, grab a beer from the fridge and invite their buddies for a BBQ at my place and then say "but you said I could do whatever I needed"

    I absolutely understand what happened here. The point is there is no benefit to these Agentic AIs because they need to be as supervised as a monkey with a knife... why would I ever want that? let alone need that

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  • [–] 1 point 10 months ago (1 child)

    Again I get your point… but no reasonable plumber would make that mistake.

    To extend your analogy, agentic AI isn't the "reasonable plumber", its the sketchy guy that says he can fix plumbing and upon arrival he admits he's a meth addict that hasn't slept in 3 days and is seeing "the shadow people" standing right there in the room with you.

    I absolutely understand what happened here. The point is there is no benefit to these Agentic AIs because they need to be as supervised as a monkey with a knife… why would I ever want that? let alone need that

    I can see applications for agentic AI, but they can't be handed the keys to the kingdom. You put them in an indestructible room with a hammer and a pile of rocks and say "please crush any rock I hand you to be no bigger than a walnut and no smaller than an almond". In IT terms, the agenic AI could run under a restrictive service account so that even if they went off the rails they wouldn't be able to damage any thing you cared about.

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