Britain is increasingly dependent on US tech giants, handing over its data and infrastructure. The AI strategy promoted by the government is criticized for not building national sovereignty or a cloud ecosystem. The NHS's data could be utilized by US researchers for profit, which raises concerns over the UK becoming a mere testing ground for American models. Promises of efficiency gains and job creation seem dubious due to the nature of datacentres, which require significant investment yet create few jobs.
Britain risks becoming a satellite of the US tech industry—a nation whose public infrastructure serves primarily as a testing ground and data source for American AI models.
The UK should not become a site of extractivism, in which value—whether in the form of knowledge, labour or electricity—is supplied by Britain but monetised in the US.
The government’s strategy does nothing to build a domestic cloud ecosystem, leading to concerns that public data, largely from the NHS, will be used to benefit US corporations.
Even the promise of job creation appears shaky, as datacentres—being capital-intensive and energy-hungry—employ only about 50 people each.
#uk-technology-policy #ai-and-data-sovereignty #public-services-and-ai #us-tech-industry-influence #nhs-and-ai-integration
Collection
[
|
...
]