By the WahLiao desk · Last verified 1 October 2026
Is Super Intelligence, the kind of AI behind ChatGPT, Claude and Gemini, dangerous? The fairest answer in 2026 is: some harms are already here and measurable, and a smaller set of much larger risks is seriously debated. Everyday problems such as confident errors, bias, scams, privacy leaks and deepfakes are documented. The frontier debate, over misuse for biological or cyber attacks and whether future systems could slip out of human control, divides respected experts. The International AI Safety Report 2026, chaired by Yoshua Bengio, written by over 100 experts and backed by more than 30 countries and international organisations, found that current systems “lack the capabilities” to pose loss-of-control risks, while their autonomous abilities are improving.
The single most useful rule: worry in proportion. Guard hard against the harms that can reach you this week (a cloned voice asking for money, a wrong answer you act on), and follow the bigger debate through named, accountable sources rather than viral clips.
AI safety and risk: quick facts
| Main expert review | International AI Safety Report 2026, published 3 February 2026, chaired by Yoshua Bengio |
| Three risk buckets | Malicious use, malfunctions, and systemic risks (the report’s own grouping) |
| Singapore’s safety body | Digital Trust Centre at NTU, designated Singapore’s AI Safety Institute on 22 May 2024 |
| Singapore Consensus | Research priorities agreed by 100+ experts after a Singapore conference on 26 April 2025 |
| EU AI Act | Main high-risk rules now start 2 December 2027 (stand-alone systems) and 2 August 2028 (in regulated products) |
| Singapore scams, 2025 | 41,974 cases, S$913.1 million lost, both down on 2024 (Singapore Police Force) |
The WahLiao Verdict
| Real today | Errors, scams, deepfakes, privacy leaks. Act on these now. |
| Genuinely debated | Loss of control. Serious people disagree; nobody has proof either way. |
| Watch closely | Bio and cyber misuse, flagged by labs and the Bengio report alike. |
| Ignore | Anyone certain it is either nothing or the end of the world. |
| Your job | Verify, protect your data, report fakes. The rest is policy. |
The everyday harms: already here
The most common harm is the simplest: Super Intelligence can be fluently wrong. The International AI Safety Report lists “fabricating information, producing flawed code, and giving misleading advice” among current malfunctions. Our explainer on how Super Intelligence works shows why a system that predicts plausible text can make confident mistakes. Bias is the quieter cousin: a model trained on skewed data can give skewed results, which matters most when it is used to screen people.
Then come the harms people cause with it. The Bengio report documents AI-generated content used in scams and fraud, and rising deepfakes, including non-consensual intimate images. In Singapore, total scam losses actually fell in 2025, to S$913.1 million across 41,974 cases according to the Singapore Police Force, but voice clones and fake video calls give old tricks a new face. See how to spot a deepfake scam and what happens to what you type.
The societal risks: jobs, power and elections
On jobs, the International AI Safety Report says economists disagree on the overall employment effect, but notes early evidence of “declining demand for early-career workers” in AI-exposed fields. For the Singapore picture, read Budget 2026 and your job.
A second worry is concentration: a handful of companies and countries control the most capable models, the chips and the data centres, which raises questions about competition and who sets the rules. Our guide to who makes the models maps the field.
Elections are where deepfakes meet democracy. Singapore passed the Elections (Integrity of Online Advertising) (Amendment) Act on 15 October 2024. It bans publishing digitally manipulated online election advertising that realistically shows a candidate saying or doing something they did not, from the issue of the writ to the close of polling. Details are in deepfakes and the law.
The frontier debate: misuse and loss of control
Two frontier risks get the most attention. The first is misuse: helping someone build a biological weapon or run a cyberattack. The Bengio report notes that several developers released new models with extra safeguards because they “could not exclude the possibility” of the models helping novices towards biological weapons, and that AI agents are now capable of finding software vulnerabilities. The second is loss of control: future systems, especially AI agents acting on their own, pursuing goals nobody intended in ways people cannot stop.
Here the range of views is wide, and worth stating fairly.
Concerned. In May 2023 the Center for AI Safety published a one-sentence statement: “Mitigating the risk of extinction from AI should be a global priority alongside other societal-scale risks such as pandemics and nuclear war.” Signatories included Turing Award winners Geoffrey Hinton and Yoshua Bengio, OpenAI’s Sam Altman and Google DeepMind’s Demis Hassabis.
Sceptical. Yann LeCun, then Meta’s chief AI scientist, called the doomsday scenario “preposterous” in 2023, arguing it is “not the way anything works in the world”.
Focus on now. Critics such as machine-learning scientist Sasha Luccioni argued that talk of extinction distracts from present harms like bias and consent.
The scientific middle. The 2026 International AI Safety Report does not pick a side. It says current systems cannot pose loss-of-control risks, that capabilities are improving, and that experts substantially disagree on how fast progress will come.
A note on words: “superintelligence” in this debate means a hypothetical system far beyond human ability, not WahLiao’s house name for all AI. We explain the difference in AGI and superintelligence explained.
What is being done
The labs. At the Seoul summit on 21 May 2024, 16 companies including Amazon, Anthropic, Google, Meta, Microsoft and OpenAI signed the Frontier AI Safety Commitments, agreeing to publish safety frameworks, define intolerable risk thresholds and, in extreme cases, not develop or deploy a model at all. Examples include OpenAI’s Preparedness Framework (updated April 2025, tracking biological and chemical, cybersecurity and AI self-improvement risks) and Anthropic’s Responsible Scaling Policy (version 3, February 2026). These are self-imposed; critics note that companies both write and mark their own tests.
Governments and scientists. Singapore’s AI Safety Institute, the Digital Trust Centre at NTU, belongs to an international network with Australia, Canada, the EU, France, Japan, Kenya, South Korea, the UK and the US, which in December 2025 began renaming itself the International Network for Advanced AI Measurement, Evaluation and Science. The Singapore Consensus on Global AI Safety Research Priorities, drawn up after a Singapore conference on 26 April 2025, groups safety research into three areas: building trustworthy systems (development), evaluating their risks (assessment), and monitoring and intervening after release (control).
Laws. The EU AI Act is the broadest law. A “Digital Omnibus” amendment in force since 27 July 2026 pushed its main high-risk rules to 2 December 2027 and 2 August 2028, and added a ban on AI systems designed to generate non-consensual intimate imagery and child sexual abuse material. Singapore prefers targeted laws plus voluntary guidance: the election deepfake law, the Online Safety Commission (operating since 29 June 2026, starting with harms such as intimate image abuse, doxxing and online harassment), and IMDA’s Model AI Governance Framework for Agentic AI, launched on 22 January 2026. More in Singapore’s Super Intelligence plan.
Risks side by side
| Risk | Near or long term | What is being done | What you can do |
|---|---|---|---|
| Confident errors | Now | Lab testing; model reports | Check anything that matters at the official source |
| Bias in decisions | Now | Governance frameworks; EU high-risk rules from 2027 | Ask whether a person reviews AI-screened decisions |
| Scams and voice clones | Now | Police enforcement, platform takedowns | Call back on a known number; agree a family code word |
| Privacy leaks | Now | PDPA; provider opt-outs | Keep NRIC, passwords and client data out of chatbots |
| Election deepfakes | Now, peaks at elections | Singapore ban from writ to polling | Do not share; report suspected fakes |
| Jobs disruption | Now to 2030s | Retraining support, research | Learn the tools in your own field |
| Bio and cyber misuse | Emerging | Lab safeguards, safety institute testing | Keep software updated; use strong sign-in |
| Loss of control | Debated, longer term | Safety research, the Singapore Consensus | Follow named, accountable sources |
AI safety and risk: FAQ
Is AI dangerous?
Some harms are real now: confident errors, scams, deepfakes and privacy leaks. Bigger risks such as bio misuse and loss of control are debated by experts, and the 2026 International AI Safety Report says current systems cannot yet cause loss of control.
Could AI cause human extinction?
Experts disagree. Signatories of the 2023 Center for AI Safety statement called extinction risk a global priority; sceptics such as Yann LeCun call the idea preposterous. No one has evidence that settles it.
Does Singapore have an AI Safety Institute?
Yes. IMDA designated the Digital Trust Centre at NTU as Singapore’s AI Safety Institute on 22 May 2024. It works with counterparts in the international network of safety institutes.
What is the Singapore Consensus on AI safety?
A 2025 report by more than 100 experts from academia, industry and government setting shared priorities for AI safety research in three areas: development, assessment and control.
When do the EU AI Act rules apply?
The Act is being phased in, and some parts already apply. After the 2026 amendment, the main rules for high-risk systems start on 2 December 2027, or 2 August 2028 for AI built into regulated products.
Read next
This page belongs to Super Intelligence. Next, read Super Intelligence, energy and Singapore’s data centres.
Sources checked 1 October 2026: International AI Safety Report 2026; techUK, release of the 2026 report; AI News, Center for AI Safety statement; Fortune, Yann LeCun on AI risk; NTU, Digital Trust Centre designated AI Safety Institute; Singapore AISI, the Singapore Consensus; arXiv, Singapore Consensus report; UKTN, safety institute network renamed; GOV.UK, Frontier AI Safety Commitments; OpenAI, Preparedness Framework update; Anthropic, Responsible Scaling Policy v3; Hunton, EU Digital Omnibus on AI in force; Rajah & Tann, election deepfake law; MinLaw, Online Safety Commission; Baker McKenzie, Model AI Governance Framework for Agentic AI; Singapore Police Force, 2025 scam figures. General information. Last updated 1 October 2026.
