Bill Gates warns AI could enable bioterrorism and disrupt millions of jobs without preparation

Bill Gates says there's 'no upper limit' on AI, citing opportunity and risk

Bill Gates had a front-row seat for the rise of AI, from his longtime work at Microsoft to early demonstrations of key breakthroughs from OpenAI that illustrated the technology's potential. Now he's urging the rest of us to get ready. Likening the situation to his pre-COVID warnings about pandemic preparedness, Gates writes in his annual "Year Ahead" letter Friday morning that the world needs to act before AI's disruptions become unmanageable. But he says that AI's potential to transform healthcare, climate adaptation, and education remains enormous, if we can navigate the risks. "There is no upper limit on how intelligent AIs will get or on how good robots will get, and I believe the advances will not plateau before exceeding human levels," Gates writes. He acknowledges that missed deadlines for artificial general intelligence, or human-level AI, can "create the impression that these things will never happen." But he warns against reaching that conclusion, arguing that bigger breakthroughs are coming, even if the timing remains uncertain. He says he's still optimistic overall. "As hard as last year was, I don't believe we will slide back into the Dark Ages," he writes. "I believe that, within the next decade, we will not only get the world back on track but enter a new era of unprecedented progress." But he adds that we'll need to be "deliberate about how this technology is developed, governed, and deployed" -- and that governments, not just markets, will have to lead AI implementation. More takeaways from the letter: Job disruption is already here. He says AI makes software developers "at least twice as efficient," and that disruption is spreading. Warehouse work and phone support are next. He suggests the world use 2026 to prepare, citing the potential for changes like a shorter work week. Bioterrorism is his top AI concern. Gates warns that "an even greater risk than a naturally caused pandemic is that a non-government group will use open source AI tools to design a bioterrorism weapon." Climate will cause "enormous suffering" without action. Gates cautions that if we don't limit climate change, it will join poverty and infectious disease in hitting the world's poorest people hardest, and even in the best case, temperatures will keep rising. Child mortality went backward in 2025. Stepping outside AI, Gates calls this the thing he's "most upset about." Deaths for children under 5 years old rose from 4.6 million in 2024 to 4.8 million in 2025, the first increase this century, which he traced to cuts in aid from rich countries. AI could leapfrog rich-world farming. Gates predicts AI will soon give poor farmers "better advice about weather, prices, crop diseases, and soil than even the richest farmers get today." The Gates Foundation has committed $1.4 billion to help farmers facing extreme weather. Gates is using AI for his own health. He says he uses AI "to better understand my own health," and sees a future where high-quality medical advice is available to every patient and provider around the clock. AI is now the Gates Foundation's biggest bet in education. Personalized learning powered by AI is "now the biggest focus of the Gates Foundation's spending on education." Gates says he's seen it working firsthand in New Jersey and believes it will be "game changing" at scale. Read the full letter here.

Bill Gates says AI could be used as a bioterrorism weapon akin to the COVID pandemic if it falls into the wrong hands | Fortune

The wheel, the internet, the car, and electricity. All of these human creations pale in comparison to artificial intelligence, Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates believes. In his annual letter released today, the Microsoft co-founder wrote that, "Of all the things humans have ever created, AI will change society the most." That change could be ultimately for the better, but it also poses considerable threats to the global population, he wrote. Gates has long been bullish on the opportunities that the revolutionary technology offers, particularly in industries like healthcare and education. However, he has also been mindful of the risks it poses, particularly if it falls into the hands of bad actors. As such, there's a flipside to the major healthcare transformations AI could bring. The 70-year-old philanthropist wrote: "In 2015, I gave a TED talk warning that the world was not ready to handle a pandemic. If we had prepared properly for the Covid pandemic, the amount of human suffering would have been dramatically less." "Today, an even greater risk than a naturally caused pandemic is that a non-government group will use open source AI tools to design a bioterrorism weapon." Gates was keen to highlight that society needs to do more to ready itself for an AI era, and that work so far hasn't been adequate. There are two key issues arising because of the technology, he believes, the first being artificial intelligence being used by bad actors, and the second being disruption to the jobs market. "Both are real risks that we need to do a better job managing," Gates wrote, adding, "We'll need to be deliberate about how this technology is developed, governed, and deployed." Companies and regulators are already grappling with the ramifications of AI being used for harmful outcomes. Only this week, Elon Musk's xAI was told by Britain's Technology Secretary Liz Kendall that it must "urgently" deal with a surge in sexualized images of women and children, generated without consent, by its artificial intelligence-powered tool Grok -- which the company has now partially restricted. No one can quite agree on how significantly AI will upset the labor market. Fed chairman Jerome Powell, for example, said he is watching the data "very carefully" to monitor how deeply the hiring market will shift because of efficiencies offered by the tech. Meanwhile, a note from Oxford Economics this week suggested that "firms don't appear to be replacing workers with AI on a significant scale," suggesting instead that companies may be using the headlines as a cover for routine headcount reductions. "We suspect some firms are trying to dress up layoffs as a good news story rather than bad news, such as past over-hiring," the note explained. Gates described a broader picture: One in which instead of laying off workers, their hours could be reduced or "even decide there are some areas we don't want to use AI in." "In a mathematical sense, we should be able to allocate these new capabilities in ways that benefit everyone," he wrote. "We're already starting to see the impact of AI on the job market, and I think this impact will grow over the next five years," Gates continued. "Even if the transition takes longer than I expect, we should use 2026 to prepare ourselves for these changes -- including which policies will best help spread the wealth and deal with the important role jobs play in our society. Different political parties will likely suggest different approaches."