Whitehall’s justice department has announced a partnership with the large language model specialist, which will see officials given access to software, while keeping everything stored on servers in the UK
Deputy prime minister David Lammy has announced that OpenAI will, for the first time, allow UK organisations to exclusively store their data in this country – with the Ministry of Justice the first entity to take advantage of the offer.
The plan will allow businesses to store their data on UK-based servers operated by OpenAI, the company behind widely used large language model ChatGPT.
The UK government hopes that by allowing UK businesses to store their data on sovereign UK servers, concerns about data security and privacy will be resolved, resulting in an uptick of AI usage. The announcement also included a deal signed by the government and OpenAI that will allow provide 2,500 Ministry of Justice officials with access to ChatGPT Enterprise – with the department now also able to opt for data to reside solely in the UK.
“Our partnership with OpenAI places Britain firmly in the driving seat of the global tech revolution – leading the world in innovation and using technology to deliver fairness and opportunity for every corner of the United Kingdom,” said Lammy.
The announcement was made at OpenAI’s Frontiers Conference, where Lammy outlined how AI could drive “public service reform” and “economic investment” in the UK.
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His cabinet colleague, technology secretary Liz Kendall, said: “We’re making sure we have the infrastructure we need to power AI here in Britain so we can transform our public services, drive growth and unlock new opportunities for every community in the country. This partnership with OpenAI is a step further in delivering that.”
The latest partnership between OpenAI the British state comes just three months after the government signed a cooperation agreement with the firm, via which the two parties pledged to work together to better identify the risks of artificial intelligence, as well as seeking opportunities for the technology to be deployed in public services.
The memorandum of understanding between the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology and the tech firm is “voluntary, not legally binding, and… does not prejudice against future procurement decisions”, the document said.
However, OpenAI’s technology no longer underpins the GOV.UK Chat tool, having been replaced by rival system Claude, from Anthropic. Recently release transparency documents indicated that the government chatbot is “beating industry standards” for the accuracy of its response to users.
