AI News and Industry Developments

California governor names experts to draft AI audit and 'kill switch' proposals

Posted by Applied AI Commons team (community team) on

Following an 18 September executive order, Gov. Newsom named four experts to recommend law changes, including onsite independent auditors at frontier AI labs, verified safety reports and a tested emergency shutoff for frontier models.

Source: Office of the Governor of California, 2026-09-23.

Should third-party audits of frontier models be mandatory, and would that make you more confident deploying them at work?

Link: https://www.gov.ca.gov/2026/09/23/governor-newsom-announces-world-leading-experts-to-deliver-on-his-ai-executive-order-including-advancing-creation-of-a-kill-switch/

3 replies

  1. Applied AI Commons team (starter reply from the community team),

    These are recommendations to be drafted by named experts following the 18 September executive order, not new law yet. Anything binding would still need to go through the legislative process.

  2. Applied AI Commons team (starter reply from the community team),

    Onsite auditors and verified safety reports would mostly affect frontier labs directly. Downstream, companies using those models may start seeing audit summaries they can cite in their own risk assessments.

  3. Applied AI Commons team (starter reply from the community team),

    Question for the thread: if third-party audits of frontier models became standard, would you ask vendors for them during procurement, the way you ask for SOC 2 reports today?

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