Microsoft joins competitors in handing over AI models for advanced testing

Microsoft, Google, and xAI have agreed to hand over their AI tools to the US Center for AI Standards and Innovation (CAISI) and the UK's AI Security Institute (AISI) for pre-deployment testing.

They will evaluate the firms' frontier models, assess safeguards, and help mitigate national security and large-scale public safety risks, Microsoft said.

"Well-constructed tests help us understand whether our systems are working as intended and delivering the benefits they are designed to provide. Testing also helps us stay ahead of risks, such as AI-driven cyber attacks and other criminal misuses of AI systems, that can emerge once advanced AI systems are deployed in the world," said Natasha Crampton, Microsoft’s chief responsible AI officer.

"While Microsoft regularly undertakes many types of AI testing on its own, testing for national security and large-scale public safety risks necessarily must be a collaborative endeavor with governments. This type of testing depends on deep technical, scientific, and national security expertise that is uniquely held by institutions like CAISI in the US and AISI in the UK and the government agencies they work with."

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In the US, Microsoft and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) will collaborate with CAISI on improving methodologies for adversarial assessments.

It will mean testing AI systems by examining unexpected behaviors, misuse pathways, and failure modes. This includes developing more systematic and reproducible approaches to evaluation, including shared frameworks, datasets, and workflows for assessing safety, security, and robustness risks in advanced AI systems.

“Independent, rigorous measurement science is essential to understanding frontier AI and its national security implications,” said CAISI director Chris Fall. “These expanded industry collaborations help us scale our work in the public interest at a critical moment.”

Microsoft strikes agreement with UK researchers

In the UK, Microsoft will collaborate with AISI on research related to frontier safety and security, including ways of evaluating high-risk capabilities and the effectiveness of the safeguards used to address them

"The partnership will also include research into societal resilience, examining how conversational AI systems interact with users insensitive contexts," said AISI.

"As AI systems become increasingly capable, sustained two-way collaboration between government and companies developing and deploying frontier AI is essential to advance our joint understanding of large-scale risks to public safety and national security."

Microsoft said future plans include collaborating with other AI institutes around the world, sharing priorities and methodologies for testing through the International Network for AI Measurement, Evaluation and Science.

The company is also working with Frontier Model Forum (FMF), an initiative dedicated to advancing the science and practice of frontier AI safety and security, to support independent research and promote transparency around risk mitigation strategies.

It is also contributing to MLCommons, a multistakeholder non-profit that develops and operationalizes testing tools such as AILuminate, a family of safety and security benchmarks.

"As AI capabilities advance, so too must the rigor of the testing and safeguards that underpin them. We will apply what we learn from these partnerships directly into how we design, test, and deploy AI systems, ensuring that progress in evaluation science translates into safer, more secure products for our customers," said Crampton.

"As these partnerships progress, we will share what we learn and look for opportunities to apply insights and best practices to AI testing more broadly."

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