AI-Powered Terminators Are Already Here, and They're After Your Job

When it comes to AI vs. anti-AI online debates, it is not uncommon for the proponents of artificial intelligence to accuse the other side of irrational fear-mongering, reducing the arguments of the anti-AI crowd to "the end is nigh" alarmist warnings and unsubstantiated fears of a Terminator-like scenario where machines wage actual war against humanity. As fraudulent as this strawmanning might be, it ironically highlights a valid reason to regulate the controversial technology to high heaven, considering that Terminators are already here, and unlike Cameron's vision, they are after something many people hold more dear than their lives – their jobs.

Reddit user cawfee caused quite a stir on r/sysadmin over the weekend after sharing a story about one such "Terminator" that an undisclosed company currently has in development. As revealed by cawfee, they attended a sales pitch for a WIP "productivity monitoring" software – and the description of its capabilities sounds like Amazon's HR department's ultimate dream and every office worker's worst nightmare.

For one, the software in question includes a range of spying-esque surveillance features already familiar in the corporate world of tech companies, such as tracking your mouse movements, taking periodic screenshots of your desktop, logging the programs you have open, and creating real-time recordings and heatmaps of where you click in any program.

But here's where it gets even more eerie: the program allows managers to sort their subordinates into so-called "work categories" and leverage AI to generate a "productivity graph" that tracks various metrics – like typing speed, websites visited, emails sent, etc. – and compares the performance of workers against one another. Consequently, these graphs enable extreme micromanagement by scrutinizing every action on your work computer, and if your mouse clicks or typing speed drop below a certain threshold, you're hit with a red flag that could land you in a meeting with the higher-ups to explain your "gap in productivity."

According to cawfee, the algorithm is applied to any action you do – or rather, don't do – during working hours. Take a little too long to respond to an email or fill out a form? That's a red flag. Let your desktop sit idle for 30 to 60 seconds? Here's a red flag with your name on it. Work hard Monday through Thursday so you can take it easy on Friday? You guessed it – a red flag.

The icing on the cake is the fact that the anonymous corporation working on this job-Terminator is also selling AI automation services and can use the gathered data about employees for "workflow efficiency automation," a.k.a. figuring out whether your job can be handled by a machine, creating an unsettling dynamic where one AI model buries you in red flags for every minor infraction and another AI model steps in to throw you out on the street – all under the umbrella of the same company.

Speaking of The Terminator, just recently, StabilityAI, the developer behind Stable Diffusion, announced that director James Cameron had joined the company's board of directors to help drive its growth, with StabilityAI planning to leverage Cameron's "artist-centric perspective, paired with his business and technical acumen."

This marked a sharp turn from Cameron's stance just a year ago, when he made a statement against the rapid advancements in the AI field and echoed concerns from industry experts about the potential dangers of artificial intelligence, saying he had tried to warn humanity back in 1984 with The Terminator films – but no one listened.

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