Salesforce CEO: It’s time for a new view on AI

Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff has pledged to ensure the company’s work on AI tools keeps user privacy and security at the forefront.

Speaking in his opening keynote at Dreamforce 2023, Benioff spent much of his time discussing the company’s new AI-powered launches, including Einstein 1, which looks to improve customer productivity and efficiency across the board.

But he also dwelt heavily on the role AI can play for users everywhere, but only if it remains trusted and secure – pledging that Salesforce will continue to strive for this.

AI protection

In his keynote, Benioff emphasized that Salesforce isn’t interested in making money from customer data, but instead is focused on protecting that data when it is being used in AI apps and services.

“The AI revolution is a trust revolution,” Benioff said. “Your data is not our product.”

Salesforce revealed a selection of new AI-based platforms at the event, including Einstein Copilot and the accompanying Einstein Copilot Studio, which allows users to build their own prompts and models using data from across the Salesforce platform and app suite.

Protecting these, is the Einstein Trust Layer, which the company says is able to keep data protected from LLMs and other platforms, whilst still allowing Salesforce to help customers improve responses from the new platforms.

This, along with Salesforce’s ongoing commitments to keep its users safe whilst also looking to lead the way in AI innovation, should stand both parties in good stead going forward, Benioff noted.

“We advance responsible AI globally, and transparency builds trust,” he concluded, “We all know what happens when AI can go very wrong. Let’s keep it going in the right direction.”