You should be afraid of AI: OpenAI CEO Sam Altman warns users

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman accepts that the world is right to be afraid about the future of AI. At the same time, he says, you should trust AI companies to do the right thing.Sam Altman says the world is right to be afraid of AI. (Photo: Reuters)The public debate around AI has been quite grim lately with fears of the technology being a threat to humans. Now, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has accepted that it is not wrong if you are afraid of AI. But Altman says that you should probably trust AI companies to do the right thing.Speaking during the Dreamforce conference, Sam Altman addressed concerns about things going wrong with more advanced AI models. "It doesn't take as much imagination as it used to for [us] to imagine how this could go wrong," he said. "I think the world is right to be afraid of this."Trust AI companies, Sam Altman saysHowever, the OpenAI chief insisted that companies building AI will be able to manage these risks going forward. "The world should trust that we are going to do the right thing because it's the right thing, and we feel the magnitude of this," Altman said. Altman claimed that he was "very confident" that the industry could keep the technology aligned with human values.His comments come at a time when several AI researchers from OpenAI, Anthropic, and Google DeepMind have admitted that AI may be a threat to humanity. However, Sam Altman and other AI leaders, including Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei have called for a slow-down in AI development. With Amodei suggesting a framework to do so. According to Altman, the recent fears around AI were likely caused by the rapid advancements made by new AI models. “These models are in some ways going to become more capable, smarter than people. That finally happened,” he said. OpenAI’s latest release was GPT-6 Astra, which some, including Nvidia CEO’s Jensen Huang, claim to be the start of AGI.Sam Altman believes that people are particularly impacted when someone gives a probability of doomsday. “So I think that was a big change to why now when people say, you know, my probability of doom is X or Y or whatever, it hits in a different way,” he added. Previously, Anthropic’s safety lead Evan Hubinger said that there was a 10 per cent chance of AI ending humanity within the next decade.We have seen cases, such as the incident where 700 rogue AI agents tried to hack US company Hugging Face, which has further fuelled concerns. AI leaders, however, seem divided when it comes to approaching the AI safety issue. While Sam Altman and Dario Amodei have pushed for regulation, Nvidia’s Jensen Huang and Meta chief Mark Zuckerberg have argued against it. US President Donald Trump has also refused to implement such measures, citing concerns that China may gain an edge in the AI race if US companies try to slow down.- EndsPublished By: Armaan AgarwalPublished On: Sep 17, 2026 10:18 IST