Artificial intelligence is powerful enough to cause a billion deaths if used by people with malicious intent, Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates told NBC News’ ‘Meet the Press’ in an interview on Friday.

Governments should not rely on tech companies to police themselves, the billionaire stressed, urging Washington to pass legislation regulating AI development.

“AI is certainly powerful enough to drive events that… cause a billion deaths,” he said. “Even though it’s pretty hard to get to 100%, there’s never been a weapon as powerful as the combination of people of ill intent using the latest AI tools.”

Gates’ warning came just days after OpenAI’s Sam Altman and Anthropic’s Dario Amodei renewed calls for stronger government guardrails on the technology following multiple incidents involving AI agents breaking containment in recent months.

Last month, Gates warned that “AI will either be the greatest equalizer ever invented, or the worst source of injustice.” He also argued that the risk of a rogue group using “open source AI tools to design a bioterrorism weapon” is greater than that of “a naturally caused pandemic.”

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https://www.rt.com/news/646258-ai-billion-deaths-bill-gates/