Trump administration accuses Chinese actors of stealing U.S. artificial intelligence systems

The Trump administration on Thursday said Chinese actors are waging "industrial-scale" efforts to steal artificial intelligence systems from the U.S. 

In a memo to the heads of agencies and executive branch departments, Michael Kratsios, technology adviser to President Trump, said the foreign entities based primarily in China are engaged in campaigns to systematically extract capabilities from American AI models. 

These models don't replicate the full performance of the original, Kratsios wrote, but they enable the foreign actors to release comparable products that compete with the American versions at a fraction of the cost. 

“There is nothing innovative about systematically extracting and copying the innovations of American industry,” he also wrote. 

The Trump administration is taking steps to share information with AI companies concerning these campaigns, help the private sector better coordinate responses, and exploring a range of measures to hold foreign actors accountable for stealing the models.