Is China Really Stealing AI Technology from U.S. Companies?
What happened
美国AI公司指责中国企业用“蒸馏”技术偷师，就是把大模型当老师，用它的回答来训练自家更小的模型。但专家说这指控夸大了，因为蒸馏只能拿到表面的文字输出，拿不到底层的代码和训练细节，中国公司还是得先自己搭出一个足够强的基座模型。另外，Anthropic刚因非法用版权书训练模型赔了15亿美元，OpenAI也正被纽约时报起诉，美国法院还没判蒸馏到底算不算偷商业机密。
Coverage
Follow the reports to see the story from different sides.
- New York Times ChinesePickIs China Really Stealing AI Technology from U.S. Companies?
The NYT breaks down why 'distillation' became a flashpoint in US-China AI talks. Anthropic and OpenAI accuse Chinese firms of distilling their proprietary models, but experts say the claim is overblown—distillation only captures output text, not source code or training internals. Chinese labs still need to build a strong base model first. The piece also notes Anthropic just paid $1.5B for using copyrighted data, and OpenAI faces a similar suit from the NYT. U.S. courts haven't ruled on whether distillation violates trade-secret law.
Heat over time
Not enough continuous observations to draw a trend yet.