The Indian government will regulate artificial intelligence “through the prism of user harm”, Minister of State for Electronics and Information Technology Rajeev Chandrasekhar said on Friday, PTI reported.

Artificial intelligence, or AI, is technology that enables a computer to think or act in a more “human” way. Interest in artificial intelligence has risen in recent months after the release of Microsoft-backed OpenAI’s ChatGPT. Several governments are now considering how to mitigate the dangers of rapid advances in artificial intelligence.

At a press conference on Friday, Chandrasekhar said that there will be no threat to jobs from artificial intelligence in the next few years. But it may happen after five to seven years, he said.

“The current stage of the development of AI is very task-oriented, and not based on reasoning, logic etc,” the minister said. “Most jobs need reasoning and logic which currently no AI is capable of performing.”

He mentioned that 85 crore Indians use the internet and the figure is expected to increase to 120 crores by 2025, NDTV reported.

“Toxicity and criminality have significantly increased on the internet,” Chandrasekhar said. “However, our approach to AI regulation, for that matter any regulation, is that we will regulate it through the prism of user harm. This has been our philosophy since 2014, that we will protect the digital nagarik [citizen].”

His comments came at a time when artificial intelligence is already being maliciously used to sully political and ideological enemies, sow hatred and manipulate public opinion.

Last month, Indian social media was flooded with a manipulated photograph to discredit the wrestlers demanding the arrest of Wrestling Federation of India chief Brij Bhushan Singh Sharan for sexual harassment. The fake image showed the wrestlers with wide smiles in a police vehicle after they had been detained, insinuating that their protest was a sham.

In April, Tamil Nadu minister P Thiaga Rajan claimed his voice had been faked in recordings that purported to feature him accusing Chief Minister MK Stalin’s family of corruption.

Also read: Should India be worried about malicious AI tools influencing politics?