"Writing National Assembly Response with ChatGPT"... MS to Provide AI Technology to Japanese Government

Digital Agency Invests 300 Million Yen... Utilized for Drafting Parliamentary Responses and Meeting Minutes

Microsoft (MS) in the United States has decided to provide Chat GPT-based technology for administrative tasks to the Japanese government. As part of digitalization efforts, the Japanese government plans to use it for drafting parliamentary responses and preparing meeting minutes in the future.

On the 28th, the Mainichi Shimbun reported that the Japanese government plans to use MS’s conversational generative artificial intelligence (AI) technology for one year. The Digital Agency is said to have invested 300 million yen (approximately 276.486 million KRW) for this purpose.

[Image source=Reuters Yonhap News]

Through this contract, MS will provide conversational generative AI technology to the Digital Agency. Above all, since it will be used in government offices, MS will establish dedicated secure facilities in Japan to handle confidential information.

The reason the Japanese government partnered with MS is to promote “digitalization of administration” and “work style reform.” Starting this fall, the government plans to use generative AI for drafting parliamentary responses, preparing meeting minutes, and supporting government statistics analysis. The Digital Agency and the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry are considering rapid adoption. Nikkei reported, "Employees will be able to improve work efficiency by referring to AI-generated responses."

This is the second time MS is introducing such a service overseas after Europe, and the first time in Asia. For this reason, it is known that MS has expanded data centers in Tokyo and Osaka and newly deployed facilities with computing power suitable for generative AI. Nikkei explained that since national secrets and other sensitive information are involved, security issues could easily arise if data centers overseas were used.

The ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) has been pushing this initiative behind the scenes, including meetings with MS executives in April. At the “Digital Society Promotion Headquarters” meeting held within the party to lead digital transformation the day before, MS representatives attended and reaffirmed the government’s policy. MS plans to leverage the contract with the Japanese government as a foothold to target private companies as well.

At the same meeting, Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirokazu Matsuno said, “The introduction of this Chat GPT-based technology is an important response from the perspective of AI utilization in Japan. It is a welcome development.”

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.