China calls for a "safety barrier" for AI amid debate over its risks

BarcelonaThe Chinese Minister of State Security, Chen Yixin, has called for the creation of a "security barrier" for artificial intelligence, at a time of growing technological competition between China and the United States. Chen has positioned AI as one of the main fields of global technological competition and has warned of the risks posed by its accelerated development.

Specifically, the Chinese minister has requested strengthening the oversight of data, algorithms, computing capacity, and the civil and military applications of the technology. Among the threats he has pointed out are the generation of false content, cyberattacks, data leaks, the manipulation of public opinion, disinformation, and the use of artificial intelligence systems for military purposes. Chen, furthermore, has defined AI as one of the main arenas of technological competition between the great powers and has called for strengthening the capacity to detect and prevent these risks.

These warnings come as Beijing tries to consolidate its position in the global race for artificial intelligence. China has simultaneously advocated for more international cooperation in this area. In July, 29 countries signed an agreement in Shanghai to create the World Artificial Intelligence Cooperation Organization, an intergovernmental organization aimed at promoting international cooperation and AI governance.

The minister's speech is also framed within the technological dispute between Beijing and Washington. China has criticized the United States' restrictions on access to certain advanced technologies and the chips necessary to develop artificial intelligence systems. Despite these limitations, Chinese companies such as DeepSeek, Alibaba, Tencent, Moonshot, and Zhipu compete with the major North American companies in the sector.

All of this coincides with an increasingly open debate within the industry itself regarding the risks of accelerating the development of AI. Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei has called for the sector to “slow down” the pace of development of the most advanced models and has proposed, among other measures, that independent evaluators have access to the systems to oversee their safety. The proposal has received support from OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and Elon Musk of xAI.

However, it has not received support from everyone, as, in the midst of this debate, Donald Trump has maintained a different position. The President of the United States has rejected the warnings about the risks of AI and has argued that the US must maintain global leadership in this field to prevent China from gaining an advantage. "Whoever wins AI, wins," the American president has stated, who believes that slowing down the development of the technology could harm the position of the US in the competition with Beijing.