Dystopian trajectory lock-in because of misuse of advanced AI to establish and/or maintain totalitarian regimes;

Classification

Domain

6. Socioeconomic & Environmental

Subdomain

6.1 Power centralization and unfair distribution of benefits

Causal entity

Human

Intent

Unintentional

Timing

Post-deployment

Subdomain definition: AI-driven concentration of power and resources within certain entities or groups, especially those with access to or ownership of powerful AI systems, leading to inequitable distribution of benefits and increased societal inequality.

Real-world incidents in this subdomain

• 17 Mar 2025LLM Scrapers Allegedly Target Multiple Open Source Projects Disrupting the FOSS Ecosystem
• 4 Jul 2021Coupang Allegedly Tweaked Search Algorithms to Boost Own Products
• 1 Aug 2018Amazon Allegedly Tweaked Search Algorithm to Boost Its Own Products
• 15 Jan 2018Gmail’s Inbox Sorting System Reportedly Reduced Visibility of Political Emails and Campaign Calls-to-Action
• 27 Sep 2017Google Fined for Changing Shopping Algorithms in EU to Favor Own Service
• 31 Dec 2016Amazon India Allegedly Rigged Search Results to Promote Own Products

How other frameworks describe this risk

• Monopolisation

  A Collaborative, Human-Centred Taxonomy of AI, Algorithmic, and Automation Harms (Abercrombie2024)

• Power concentration

  A Collaborative, Human-Centred Taxonomy of AI, Algorithmic, and Automation Harms (Abercrombie2024)

• Potential exploitation by totalitarian regimes

  The Rise of Artificial Intelligence - Future Outlooks and Emerging Risks (Allianz2018)

• Corporate power may impeded effective governance

  Foundational Challenges in Assuring Alignment and Safety of Large Language Models (Anwar2024)

• Market concentration risks and single points of failure

  International Scientific Report on the Safety of Advanced AI (Bengio2024)

• Global AI Divide

  International Scientific Report on the Safety of Advanced AI (Bengio2024)

• Global AI R&D divide

  International AI Safety Report 2025 (Bengio2025)

• Market concentration and single points of failure

  International AI Safety Report 2025 (Bengio2025)

Other entries from Maas2023

• Alignment failures in existing ML systems Risk Category · 7.1
• Faulty reward functions in the wild Risk Sub-Category · 7.1
• Specification gaming Risk Sub-Category · 7.1
• Reward model overoptimization Risk Sub-Category · 7.1
• Instrumental convergence Risk Sub-Category · 7.1
• Goal misgeneralization Risk Sub-Category · 7.1
• Inner misalignment Risk Sub-Category · 7.1
• Language model misalignment Risk Sub-Category · 7.1
• Harms from increasingly agentic algorithmic systems Risk Sub-Category · 7.2
• Dangerous capabilities in AI systems Risk Category · 7.2
• Situational awareness Risk Sub-Category · 7.2
• Acquisition of a goal to harm society Risk Sub-Category · 4.2