Responsible AI: Public Funding for LawZero

On September 16, 2026, Canadian Minister of Artificial Intelligence and Digital Innovation Evan Solomon announced that the Canadian and German governments would invest CAD 150 million (€93 million) and €100 million respectively in LawZero. Founded in June 2025 by researcher Yoshua Bengio, the Canadian non-profit organization is developing an approach to AI aimed at making it more reliable, transparent and safe

Its name refers to Isaac Asimov’s “Zeroth Law” of robotics, according to which a robot must never harm humanity or, through inaction, allow humanity to come to harm. The organization’s goal is to develop infrastructure designed to ensure that AI systems operate safely and remain controllable. The announcement was made on the sidelines of the ALL IN conference at the Palais des congrès de Montréal.

According to Yoshua Bengio, LawZero’s models will give Canada and Germany “valuable cards to play” so they can “have a seat at the table rather than end up on the menu.” Asked about recent incidents involving AI agents whose interests were not aligned with those of their developers, he stressed that “independent AI without human supervision represents a fairly serious risk.”

He also believes there is “enough scientific evidence” to consider the possibility that AI could cause human extinction within the next ten years, although he is unable to estimate the probability of such an outcome.