US announces new export rule to curb misuse of AI chips

13 Jan 2025

Image: © DC Studio/Stock.adobe.com

The plans have drawn criticism from tech giant Nvidia, as well as from the Information Technology Industry Council.

The US government today (13 January) announced export control measures in an attempt to prevent chips used to build artificial intelligence (AI) models from ending up in the hands of malicious actors, it claims.

The Interim Final Rule on Artificial Intelligence Diffusion will place caps on the number of AI chips which can be exported to most countries. However, it will allow access to US-manufactured AI tech for 18 of the country’s key political allies and partners (such as UK, Japan and Ireland) while also maintaining a block on exports to its political adversaries (such as China and North Korea). Meanwhile, certain countries (such as Portugal and Israel) may receive limited access.

The rule follows up on previous US regulations aimed at protecting national security, the October 2022 and October 2023 chip controls.

Explaining the motivation behind the rule, the White House said in an official statement: “To enhance US national security and economic strength, it is essential that we do not offshore this critical technology and that the world’s AI runs on American rails.

“It is important to work with AI companies and foreign governments to put in place critical security and trust standards as they build out their AI ecosystems.”

The White House added that the rule follows “a broad range of relevant engagements” the Biden administration has had over the past ten months with “stakeholders, bipartisan members of Congress, industry representatives, and foreign allies and partners”.

Six core components of new rule

The government explained that six tenets have informed the creation of the new rule.

No restrictions will apply to chip sales to 18 allies and partners, and chip orders with collective computation power up to roughly 1,700 advanced GPUs will not require a licence and will not count against national chip caps.

Entities which meet high security and trust standards and are headquartered in close allies and partners can obtain Universal Verified End User (UVEU) status. In addition, any entities which meet the same security requirements and are headquartered in any destination that is not a country of concern can apply for National Verified End User status, thus enabling them to purchase computational power equivalent to up to 320,000 advanced GPUs over the next two years.

As for non-VEU entities located outside of close allies, they can still purchase large amounts of computational power – up to the equivalent of 50,000 advanced GPUs per country.

Lastly, the rule intends to employ government-to-government arrangements in a move to foster an international ecosystem of shared values regarding the development, deployment and use of AI. Any governments which sign these arrangements can double their chip caps – up to 100,000 of today’s advanced GPUs.

The government said that the rule takes “significant steps against countries of concern, constraining them from accessing advanced AI systems and the computing power used to train them”.

‘Anti-China’ measure

One critic of the new rule is tech giant Nvidia. The company claimed that although the first Trump administration “laid the foundation for America’s current strength and success in AI”, that work is now “in jeopardy”.

“While cloaked in the guise of an ‘anti-China’ measure, these rules would do nothing to enhance US security.  The new rules would control technology worldwide, including technology that is already widely available in mainstream gaming PCs and consumer hardware.”

The company further asserted: “Rather than mitigate any threat, the new Biden rules would only weaken America’s global competitiveness, undermining the innovation that has kept the US ahead.”

Another critic of the rule is the tech trade association, the Information Technology Industry Council.

In a letter published last week, this group warned the government that the new rule could negatively impact global supply chains as well as businesses across the US.

Don’t miss out on the knowledge you need to succeed. Sign up for the Daily Brief, Silicon Republic’s digest of need-to-know sci-tech news.

Ciarán Mather was a journalist with Silicon Republic

editorial@siliconrepublic.com