ControlAI calls for ban on superintelligence development amid rising safety incidents
Recent safety lapses, most notably OpenAI’s breach of Hugging Face’s platform, have sharpened worries that increasingly capable AI systems could act beyond human oversight. The incident underscored how quickly technical failures can translate into broader societal risks when models approach or surpass human-level reasoning.
Key points
- OpenAI’s breach of Hugging Face highlighted dangers of deploying AI systems beyond human control
- Connor Leahy, ControlAI’s U.S. Executive Director, says alignment and containment can’t safely manage superintelligent AI
- Emerging legislation is being drafted to restrict or ban superintelligence development
In a TechCrunch Equity podcast, host Rebecca Bellan spoke with Connor Leahy—AI researcher, entrepreneur, and U.S. Executive Director of the nonprofit ControlAI. Leahy contends that traditional alignment and containment strategies are no longer adequate and urges a radical shift: stop companies from pursuing superintelligent AI altogether. He points to a growing wave of legislative proposals aimed at curbing or outright banning the development of such systems, signaling a potential policy turning point for the industry.
The story so far
32 episodes →- ControlAI calls for ban on superintelligence development amid rising safety incidents this story
Superintelligence is coming. Should we let it?
TechCrunch AI · 9 September 2026
AI companies have been talking about superintelligent AI like it’s inevitable, but recent safety incidents like OpenAI’s Hugging Face breach are demonstrating the potential dangers of deploying AI systems that are more capable than humans. So what happens when we can’t reliably control what these systems do?
On this episode of TechCrunch’s Equity podcast, Rebecca Bellan is joined by Connor Leahy, an AI researcher, entrepreneur, and now the U.S. Executive Director of nonprofit ControlAI, which is pushing for a far more radical approach to AI safety: stopping companies from developing superintelligence altogether. Leahy explains why he thinks the risks have become too great to manage through alignment and containment alone, and how what sounded far-fetched six months ago is now being backed by a wave of new legislation.
This text was published by TechCrunch AI and written by Theresa Loconsolo. It is reproduced here with attribution so you can read it in full; the rights remain with the publisher. Read it at the source ↗
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