OpenAI Wants to Know if an AI Industry Slowdown Would Even Be Legal | WIRED

摘要: Maxwell Zeff

Business

Sep 10, 2026 7:28 PM

OpenAI Wants to Know if an AI Industry Slowdown Would Even Be Legal

AI leaders worry antitrust law coul

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Maxwell Zeff

Business

Sep 10, 2026 7:28 PM

OpenAI Wants to Know if an AI Industry Slowdown Would Even Be Legal

AI leaders worry antitrust law could stand in the way of what they view as an increasingly urgent push to coordinate a slowdown in AI development.

Photo-Illustration: WIRED Staff; Getty Images

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OpenAI has asked

members of Congress in recent weeks for clear guidance about whether orchestrating an industry-wide

slowdown on frontier AI development

would be legal, people close to the company tell WIRED.

Substantive coordination on safety between AI labs may risk running afoul of

antitrust law

, the people say, which poses a significant obstacle to bringing major tech giants on board with the effort.

Last weekend, OpenAI’s chief scientist, Jakub Pachocki, published a

blog post

arguing that the best path forward for the AI research world includes “coordinating to slow down future development,” which he thinks will be key to ensuring that self-improving AI systems are safe. In the short term, he expects “

voluntary slowdowns

to become commonplace until shared safety bars are established.”

But some legal scholars say such an effort could conflict with US antitrust laws. Nicholas Felstead, assistant director of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission and a former AI policy fellow at the Center for Law & AI Risk, argued in a March

that a coordinated pause in AI development may amount to companies restricting output, potentially violating the Sherman Antitrust Act. It would depend “entirely on the precise details of any agreement,” Felstead wrote. “But even if most safety collaborations would ultimately survive antitrust scrutiny, legal uncertainty can act as a powerful deterrent.”

OpenAI did not respond to a request for comment ahead of publication.

There are some early signs that Congress is listening. In July, a bipartisan, bicameral g

来源: Brave/wired.com