THE United States wants cloud services providers such as Amazon.com Inc. and Microsoft Corp. to actively investigate and call out foreign clients developing artificial intelligence (AI) applications on their platforms, escalating its tech conflict with China.

The Biden administration proposal, scheduled for release today, requires such firms to reveal foreign customers’ names and IP addresses. Amazon and its peers, which include Alphabet Inc.’s Google, would have to devise a budget for collecting those details and report any suspicious activity, according to draft rule published Sunday.

If implemented, the Biden administration could use those requirements to choke off a major avenue through which Chinese firms access the data centers and servers crucial to training and hosting AI.

Those requirements also place the onus of collecting, storing and analyzing customer data on the cloud services, a burden not unlike strict “know-your-customer” rules that govern the U.S. financial industry.

U.S. cloud providers have worried that curbs on their activities with overseas users without comparable measures by allied countries risks disadvantaging American firms.

U.S. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo said Friday her team was working to eradicate “national security threats” posed by AI development, an effort likely to focus on firms from China.

The Biden administration, which has already worked to constrain China’s access to the most advanced semiconductors, wants to limit Chinese firms’ ability to develop AI.

China’s development of AI and other next-generation technologies is a top concern for Washington.

The United States has tried to rein in China’s advances by restricting chip exports to the country and sanctioning individual Chinese firms, but China’s tech leaders have managed to make significant breakthroughs despite U.S. curbs. (SD-Agencies)