Standards, Incentives, and Evidence: The Frontier AI Governance Triad

Miles Brundage · 19 Jun 2025

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Every claim below was made in this piece, quoted word for word and numbered in the order the piece makes them, so you can read it there rather than take our word for it. The sentence above each quote is our reading of the claim, not their wording. Each quote was checked against a stored copy of the page at build time; where the two differ, the quote is the fact.

Our reading
Effective governance of frontier AI requires three things together: agreed safety standards, incentives for developers to follow them, and evidence that they are being followed.
Mental modelCollective action problems

Their wordsgoverning frontier AI requires standards for safety and security, incentives for the leading AI developers to follow those standards, and evidence that the standards are being followed.
Our reading
As AI systems become more capable, the danger of false or unverifiable safety claims grows, pushing competing companies toward cutting corners.

Their wordsAs AI gets more capable, the risks associated with mistaken claims, fraudulent claims, or too-vague-to-be-verified claims will increase, and a cloud of suspicion between competitors could drive corner-cutting (indeed, this is happening already and could get worse).
Our reading
Strong whistleblower protections make the absence of visible whistleblowing meaningful evidence that a company is not committing flagrant violations.

Their wordsThe stronger such policies are, the more "absence of evidence" (lack of visible whistleblowing or lawsuits) can become "evidence of absence" (regarding flagrant violations).

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