NEW YORK (AP) — It's never fun to be scammed, but if you're a small business owner then falling for a scam can have long-lasting effects on a business, damaging client relationships and profit.
Plenty of types of scams exist, but a few affect small businesses the most.
According to the Federal Trade Commission, small businesses should be on the lookout for phony invoices and unordered merchandise. Scammers send out fake invoices and hope businesses won't notice. Similarly, scammers call saying they want to confirm an order or verify an address, and send unordered merchandise they then demand money for. Small business owners are under no obligation to pay.
Another thing to watch: if you're starting a small business, seeking out business coaching can be a helpful endeavor. But people offering those services aren't always legitimate. They charge for services they don't actually provide and ramp up fees. For legitimate business coaching contact your local Small Business Administration regional office.
The Better Business Bureau also warns of directory scams, which it says have targeted businesses for decades. Scammers try to get businesses to pay for a listing or ad space in a non-existent directory. Or they lie about being from a legitimate directory. Either way a small business pays for something that it never gets.
If you spot a scam, report it to ReportFraud.ftc.gov. You can also file a complaint with the Better Business Bureau at BBB.org/ScamTracker.
FILE - An order is entered by an employee at a diner on Nov. 17, 2020, in Philadelphia. It's never fun to be scammed, but if you're a small business owner falling for a scam can have long-lasting effects on a business, damaging client relationships and profit. (AP Photo/Matt Slocum, File)
SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — The world's leading artificial intelligence companies pledged at the start of a mini summit on AI to develop the technology safely, including pulling the plug if they can't rein in the most extreme risks.
World leaders are expected to hammer out further agreements on artificial intelligence as they gathered virtually Tuesday to discuss AI’s potential risks but also ways to promote its benefits and innovation.
The AI Seoul Summit is a low-key follow-up to November’s high-profile AI Safety Summit at Bletchley Park in the United Kingdom, where participating countries agreed to work together to contain the potentially “catastrophic” risks posed by breakneck advances in AI.
The two-day meeting -- co-hosted by the South Korean and U.K. governments -- also comes as major tech companies like Meta, OpenAI and Google roll out the latest versions of their AI models.
They're among 16 AI companies that made voluntary comittments to AI safety as the talks got underway, according to a British government announcement. The companies, which also include Amazon, Microsoft, France's Mistral AI, China's Zhipu.ai, and G42 of the United Arab Emirates, vowed to ensure safety of their most cutting edge AI models with promises of accountable governance and public transparency.
The pledge includes publishing safety frameworks setting out how they will measure risks of these models. In extreme cases where risks are severe and “intolerable," AI companies will have to hit the kill switch and stop developing or deploying their models and systems if they can't mitigate the risks.
Since the U.K. meeting last year, the AI industry has “increasingly focused on the most pressing concerns, including mis- and dis- information, data security, bias and keeping humans in the loop,” said Aiden Gomez CEO of Cohere, one of the AI companies that signed the pact. "It is essential that we continue to consider all possible risks, while prioritizing our efforts on those most likely to create problems if not properly addressed.”
On Tuesday evening, South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol and British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak are to meet other world leaders, industry bosses and heads of international organizations for a virtual conference. The online summit will be followed by an in-person meeting of digital ministers, experts and others on Wednesday, according to organizers.
“It is just six months since world leaders met at Bletchley, but even in this short space of time, the landscape of AI has changed dramatically,” Yoon and Sunak said in a joint article published in South Korea’s JoongAng Ilbo newspaper and the U.K.’s online news site Monday. “The pace of change will only continue to accelerate, so our work must accelerate too.”
While the U.K. meeting centered on AI safety issues, the agenda for this week’s gathering was expanded to include “innovation and inclusivity,” Wang Yun-jong, a deputy director of national security in South Korea, told reporters Monday.
Wang said participants will subsequently “discuss not only the risks posed by AI but also its positive aspects and how it can contribute to humanity in a balanced manner."
The AI agreement will include the outcomes of discussions on safety, innovation and inclusivity, according to Park Sang-wook, senior presidential adviser for science and technology for President Yoon.
Last year's Bletchley meeting attracted world leaders and tech luminaries like Elon Musk and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman. The Seoul summit, serving as an interim meeting until another in-person event next year in France, drew less important representatives from government and tech companies.
China, which attended the Bletchley gathering, isn't joining the virtual summit though it will send a representative to Wednesday's in-person meeting, the South Korean presidential office said.
Governments around the world have been scrambling to formulate regulations for AI even as the technology makes rapid advances and is poised to transform many aspects of daily life, from education and the workplace to copyrights and privacy. There are concerns that advances in AI could take away jobs, trick people and spread disinformation.
This week's meeting is just one of a slew of efforts to draw up AI guardrails. The U.N. General Assembly has approved its first resolution on the safe use of AI systems, while the U.S. and China recent held their first high-level talks on AI and the European Union's world-first AI Act is set to take effect later this year.
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Chan contributed to this report from London.
FILE - Britain's Prime Minister Rishi Sunk, center, speaks during a plenary session at the AI Safety Summit at Bletchley Park in Milton Keynes, England, on Nov. 2, 2023. South Korea is set to host a mini-summit this week on risks and regulation of artificial intelligence, following up on an inaugural AI safety meeting in Britain in 2023 that drew a diverse crowd of tech luminaries, researchers and officials. (AP Photo/Alastair Grant, Pool, File)
A screen shows an announcement of the AI Seoul Summit in Seoul, South Korea, Tuesday, May 21, 2024. World leaders are expected to adopt a new agreement on artificial intelligence when they gather virtually Tuesday to discuss AI’s potential risks but also ways to promote its benefits and innovation. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)
A screen shows an announcement of the AI Seoul Summit in Seoul, South Korea, Tuesday, May 21, 2024. World leaders are expected to adopt a new agreement on artificial intelligence when they gather virtually Tuesday to discuss AI’s potential risks but also ways to promote its benefits and innovation. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)
