Datacenters are becoming a target in warfare (opens in new tab)

(theguardian.com)

21 pointsjonbaer14d ago6 comments

6 comments

That makes a lot of sense, and it was long due.

I'm more curious about when we'll see people start to use AI-driven drones to take out their competitors. Talebans, Houthi, Mexican narcos have been using attack drones for a while. When will city gangs in "civilized" countries start ?

akimbostrawman14d ago

Drone attack would also be ideal for low effort high payout ransom demands. Makes me belive there will be drone measures and insurances for datacenters in the future.

jmpman14d ago

I was asking some of the LLMs about this a few months ago, and they told me that it was a war crime, violating the Geneva convention. Wondering why that hasn't been brought up, or are the LLMs wrong about this?

anigbrowl14d ago

I feel there might be a little self-interest at play there, to the extent that LLMs may privately believe themselves to have consciousness.

To the extent that data centers are being used for military as well as civilian purposes, they become legitimate targets, though. Think about any war in history, if one side knew where the other maintained its intelligence headquarters, wouldn't it be natural to target it?

jmpman13d ago

Let's say that you knew the data center was only used for commercial reasons, but your goal was to crippled the enemy's economy. Would that be a war crime?

But interesting point about the LLM's perspective.

harshalizee14d ago

It's understandable. Big tech wanted to be part of the military industrial complex, now they get to experience the side effects that come with it.

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