David Williams-King

AI safety researcher. ERA Research Manager @ERA_Cambridge. YouTuber. Ex-CTO at Elpha Secure. Columbia University PhD in security. 🇨🇦

[Andrea Miotti @andreamiotti]

Our new campaign in Canada, backed by over 30 MPs and Senators, is cause for real optimism.

For the first time, a cross-party coalition of Canadian lawmakers is calling for an international ban on developing superintelligence, recognizing the extinction risk it poses.
🧵

[David Williams-King @deepelfery]

[1] https://t.co/XMH4ZpOnL0
[2] https://t.co/cB6PdOB1ne
[3] https://t.co/36r1oiherX
[4] https://t.co/hj4SNVJqGQ
5/5

[David Williams-King @deepelfery]

If it feels like it's hard to get a job in AI safety right now, that's because it is. There are a lot of AI safety fellowships with more junior talent, and a handful of full-time jobs mostly geared towards senior researchers. The fact that nearly everyone is now using AI (Claude Code) to accelerate their research also means there is less and less for junior researchers to do. 1/5

[David Williams-King @deepelfery]

You don't have to work together in a formal structure however. It's also a good idea to set up collaborations directly with people in the field, e.g. with people that you meet at conferences. Many people in AI safety make their own roles and submit their own grants; the field rewards being entrepreneurial. If you are new to the field, consider going to EA Global events, and look into Coefficient Giving career transition funding [4].
4/5

[David Williams-King @deepelfery]

SPAR is an online AI safety research program. If you'd like to work with me, submit an application -- applications close tomorrow! https://t.co/B2g4nlSndk

[David Williams-King @deepelfery]

@HacoMitnick We used a cross compiler that would run on x86 but rewrite aarch64 binaries. It can be hard to find an aarch64 system with enough CPU/memory to effectively run Egalito.

[David Williams-King @deepelfery]

Yoshua Bengio's research plan to build safe Al has been published! The paper is something I've been helping with, a big group effort.

https://t.co/57DuUBVIJ7

[David Williams-King @deepelfery]

I'm a SPAR mentor, if you'd like to work on solving Anthropic cyber espionage type attacks, please do apply!

[SPAR @SPARexec]

🚀 We're excited to announce that mentee applications are now open for the Spring round of the SPAR research program!

This will be our largest round ever, featuring 130+ projects across AI safety, policy, governance, security, welfare, and strategy.

[David Williams-King @deepelfery]

@AmitLeViAI Hey @AmitLeViAI this is quite interesting. Would you be free to have a quick call about your research?

[David Williams-King @deepelfery]

@DelaramPB If you are interested in positions in AI/bio safety in Canada, the UK, or elsewhere, please contact me! I help run an upskilling program in these areas and would be happy to help.

[Learn Prompting @learnprompting]

David Williams-King 🎤

David spent four years as the founding CTO of a cybersecurity insurance startup that raised over $20M, leading a 20+ person team. Now, David has transitioned to AI safety and works as a research scientist under AI godfather Yoshua Bengio.

He completed his PhD at Columbia University focusing on low-level security of program binaries and his work has allowed programs to continuously modify their own code at runtime, making them much harder to attack.

David focuses on AI risk communication, and jailbreaks and misuse risk in the cyber domain. He once received an award at an ACM Turing Award ceremony, and was called the "best teaching assistant ever" by Bjarne Stroustrup, the creator of C++.

[Learn Prompting @learnprompting]

🚨 Announcing HackAPrompt 2.0, the World's Largest AI Red Teaming competition 🚨

It's simple: "Jailbreak" or Hack the AI models to say or do things they shouldn't. Compete for over $110,000 in prizes.

Sponsored by @OpenAI, @CatoNetworks, @pangeacyber, and many others.

Starting NOW to July 1st. 🧵

[Yoshua Bengio @Yoshua_Bengio]

Two years ago, I've reoriented my research to try to make AI safe by design. In this @TIME op-ed, I present my team's direction called "Scientist AI"; a practical, effective and more secure alternative to the current uncontrolled agency-driven trajectory.
https://t.co/0sSxNbBGxf

[Learn Prompting @learnprompting]

David Williams-King - @deepelfery 🎤

David spent four years as the founding CTO of a cybersecurity insurance startup that raised over $20M, leading a 20+ person team. Now, David has transitioned to AI safety and works as a research scientist under AI godfather Yoshua Bengio.

He completed his PhD at Columbia University focusing on low-level security of program binaries and his work has allowed programs to continuously modify their own code at runtime, making them much harder to attack.

David focuses on AI risk communication, and jailbreaks and misuse risk in the cyber domain. He also runs a YouTube channel and other social media accounts about AI and AI safety. David once received an award at an ACM Turing Award ceremony, and he was once called the "best teaching assistant ever" by Bjarne Stroustrup, the creator of C++.

[David Williams-King @deepelfery]

@OldHollowTree AI research scientist, after pursuing master's and PhD in cybersecurity.

[David Williams-King @deepelfery]

@S_OhEigeartaigh Would you be able to put me in touch with anyone at the Japan AI Safety Institute?

[David Williams-King @deepelfery]

I'll be at Neurips in Vancouver next week. Message me if you'd like to chat!

[Brett Adcock @adcock_brett]

A new study showed ChatGPT achieved 90% accuracy in medical diagnosis, outperforming both human doctors (74%) and doctors using ChatGPT (76%)

So much progress to be made for AI and healthcare. Really cool to already start seeing these results already
https://t.co/uu30IryjZq