Helen Toner

AI policy researcher who leads Georgetown’s Center for Security and Emerging Technology and sat on OpenAI’s board until November 2023; she warns that frontier labs cannot be trusted to govern themselves and that control lags capability.

Roles

2018 – 2018Research Affiliate, Centre for the Governance of AI, University of OxfordSpent nine months in Beijing studying China's AI ecosystem.Source →
Jan 2019 – Mar 2022Director of Strategy, Center for Security and Emerging Technology (CSET), Georgetown UniversitySource →
2021 – 21 Nov 2023Board member, OpenAIOne of the four directors who removed Sam Altman on 17 November 2023; left the board in the deal that reinstated him.Source →
Mar 2022 – Sept 2025Director of Strategy and Foundational Research Grants, Center for Security and Emerging Technology (CSET), Georgetown UniversitySource →
2 Sept 2025 – presentExecutive Director (interim from September 2025), Center for Security and Emerging Technology (CSET), Georgetown UniversityNamed Interim Executive Director on 26 August 2025; her CSET staff page now lists her as Executive Director, though the April 2026 Senate testimony still used "Interim".Source →

On the record

18 Aug 2026 · Podcast · The Ezra Klein Show, The New York Times
Our techniques for making A.I. that is more capable, smarter, more sophisticated, are working much better than our techniques for making A.I. that reliably does what we want it to do and reliably stays within the constraints we've set.
Executive Director (interim from September 2025), Center for Security and Emerging Technology (CSET), Georgetown University at the time
Quoted on CSET's page for the episode; the NYT page itself was not fetched.
The A.I.s Are Already Out of Control →
22 Apr 2026 · Testimony · US Senate Committee on the Judiciary
I think it is very important that the U.S. AI sector remains ahead of the Chinese AI sector, but if that's at the expense of AI overrunning the entire planet, then that hasn't benefitted us.
Executive Director (interim from September 2025), Center for Security and Emerging Technology (CSET), Georgetown University at the time
Hearing "Stealth Stealing: China's Ongoing Theft of U.S. Innovation"; she also said that right now "the winner of any AI race between the U.S. and China is the AI".
CSET Director Helen Toner Testifies Before Senate Judiciary Committee →
17 Sept 2024 · Testimony · US Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Privacy, Technology and the Law
The companies in question often say that it's too early for any regulation because the science of how AI works and how to make it safe is too nascent. I'd like to restate that in different words. They're saying, we don't have good science of how these systems work or how to tell when they'll be smarter than us.
Director of Strategy and Foundational Research Grants, Center for Security and Emerging Technology (CSET), Georgetown University at the time
Told senators that leading labs treat building AGI as "an entirely serious goal" that some inside think "could be as close as 1 to 3 years away".
Oversight of AI: Insiders' Perspectives →
28 May 2024 · Podcast · The TED AI Show
But for years, Sam had made it really difficult for the board to actually do that job by withholding information, misrepresenting things that were happening at the company, in some cases outright lying to the board
Director of Strategy and Foundational Research Grants, Center for Security and Emerging Technology (CSET), Georgetown University at the time
Her first long-form account of the November 2023 board action; she added that "we just couldn't believe things that Sam was telling us". Fortune's transcript of the same line reads "very difficult" rather than "really difficult".
Former OpenAI board member explains why CEO Sam Altman got fired before he was rehired →