Why many people reject AI technologies even though ChatGPT already has a billion users

The popularity of AI technologies is growing rapidly – as evidenced by the more than one billion active users of ChatGPT. Nevertheless, a recent survey shows that many people perceive AI products and the infrastructure that supports them negatively. The reasons for this are often the lack of trust, the lack of human touch and the concern about data protection-relevant aspects. Although AI systems are already finding practical applications in many areas, skepticism about these technologies remains. Many users are skeptical whether AI is able to make long-term decisions or properly assess moral dilemmas. This is also underlined by studies showing that AI agents often fail in complex or long-term decisions. In addition, digital sovereignty is seen as a central aspect in many countries, which makes the dependence on foreign AI models critical. In Germany, for example, the development of local AI models such as the hummingbird presented by Aleph Alpha is seen as an important step towards strengthening digital autonomy. At the same time, companies like Anthropic are working with lawyers and humanities researchers to train AI agents to make more ethical and complex decisions. This shows that AI development must be further developed not only technically, but also ethically and legally in order to gain user trust.