Switzerland Releases Open-Source AI Model Built For Privacy

Switzerland has launched Apertus, a fully open-source, multilingual LLM trained on 15 trillion tokens and over 1,000 languages. 'What distinguishes Apertus from many other generative AI systems is its commitment to complete openness,' reports CyberInsider. From the report: Unlike popular proprietary models, where users can only interact via APIs or hosted interfaces, Apertus provides open access to its model weights, training datasets, documentation, and even intermediate checkpoints. The source code and all training materials are released under a permissive open-source license that allows commercial use. Since the full training process is documented and reproducible, researchers and watchdogs can audit the data sources, verify compliance with data protection laws, and inspect how the model was trained. Apertus' development explicitly adhered to Swiss data protection and copyright laws, and incorporated retroactive opt-out mechanisms to respect data source preferences.

From a privacy perspective, Apertus represents a compelling shift in the AI landscape. The model only uses publicly available data, filtered to exclude personal information and to honor opt-out signals from content sources. This not only aligns with emerging regulatory frameworks like the EU AI Act, but also provides a tangible example of how AI can be both powerful and privacy-respecting. According to ETH Zurich's Imanol Schlag, technical lead of the project at ETH Zurich, Apertus is 'built for the public good' and is a demonstration of how AI can be deployed as a public digital infrastructure, much like utilities or transportation. The model is available via Swisscom's Sovereign Swiss AI Platform. It's also available through Hugging Face and the Public AI Inference Utility.

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