Ireland’s newly appointed minister for AI oversight has admitted that she’s never used ChatGPT and hasn’t yet downloaded the hot new chatbot DeepSeek to her phone, the Irish Independent reported on Tuesday.
Niamh Smyth’s new role as junior minister at the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment involves responsibilities for trade promotion, AI, and digital transformation.
Commenting on the transformative technology, Smyth said that it’s “all a new learning curve, but I will learn fast and apply myself to the new role,” adding that she felt she knew “as much as any colleague” after leading briefings on the subject in recent months.
Smyth said that one of her immediate concerns about the AI-powered technology is the degree to which high-school students may be using it to take care of their homework, though she’s also looking at the “importance of supporting businesses and providing education around the benefits of artificial intelligence to create efficiencies to demystify the use of AI.”
The story has echoes of the bizarre episode in 2018 when Japan appointed a cyber-security minister who then admitted that he’d never used a computer.
“Since I was 25 years old and independent I have instructed my staff and secretaries — I have never used a computer in my life,” 68-year-old Yoshitaka Sakurada told said in comments translated by the Kyodo news agency.
During a parliamentary session, Sakurada drew criticism when he appeared confused about basic technology-related questions. An opposition lawmaker expressed shock, saying: “I find it unbelievable that someone who is responsible for cybersecurity measures has never used a computer.”
Sakurada resigned from the post about six months later, though the reason for his departure was unrelated to his admission about never having used a computer.