Himes says AI data centers will become critical infrastructure

Jim Himes is the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee. On Wednesday, at the Brookings Institution, he said that AI data centers will become critical infrastructure. He said this is sure. The US has 16 sectors of critical infrastructure today. AI data centers are part of some of them, but they are not a sector by itself.

What is new

The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency is in charge of the 16 sectors. They range from water to financial services. Himes said important services must be in many areas, with a copy of each important function. Himes said the sites will be the same as the resilience centers of JPMorgan.

The numbers

In March, Iran hit data centers of Amazon in the United Arab Emirates with drones. It also hit one more data center in Bahrain. Russia and Ukraine hit data centers in each other country in the last weeks. JPMorganChase says it put 5 billion dollars into startups in the first year of a plan of 1.5 trillion dollars.

What is not known

There is no rule or date. Himes said the Ratepayer Protection Act has a small effect. It makes builders of data centers pay for the electricity that they use. The Senate has not done a vote on it. Himes says the work will go on, because the use of compute has no end, as Himes is told.

Insight: War makes one large site a risk

Drones hit data centers in March. Himes says AI sites will be the same as the resilience centers of JPMorgan. AMD and TCS want a plan for data centers of 200 MW maximum in India. This reads as a move to small sites that stop one by one, and builders of more sites can get more control.