Microsoft's Brad Smith on U.S. AI policy: 'Regulation without transparent or complete rules' | Fortune

Microsoft President Brad Smith criticized U.S. AI policy as lacking transparency and complete rules, telling Fortune that businesses cannot plan without them. Speaking exclusively to the outlet on the sidelines of the AI for Good Global Summit, Smith said the current approach amounts to “regulation without transparent or complete rules.” He pointed to recent U.S. restrictions that limited access to two advanced AI model families: Commerce Department action last month required Anthropic to remove its Fable 5 and Mythos 5 models worldwide under export-control law, citing a cybersecurity risk, and officials also pressed OpenAI to delay broader public rollout of GPT-5.6, limiting early access to government-vetted partners. Smith said the administration was right to act on security concerns but lacks tools beyond export controls to regulate frontier models effectively. He noted experts doubt whether export controls designed for other contexts are suited for widely accessible API-delivered AI, and referenced a June executive order that created a voluntary pre-release review without formal licensing. The article states both restrictions have since eased, with Fable 5 returning earlier this month and GPT-5.6 set to launch publicly Thursday.