Bill Gates is not holding back in his bleak prediction about the future of A.I. … and is claiming that the technology has the capability to eventually kill a billion people.

During Sunday’s episode of “Meet the Press” … he told host Kristen Welker that if its powers are abused and unchecked, A.I. could perform dangerous actions that result in a death toll in the 10 figures.

He admitted … “A.I. is certainly powerful enough to drive events that cause a billion deaths. So even though it’s pretty hard to get to 100%, there’s never been a weapon as powerful as the combination of people with ill intent using the latest A.I. tools.”

He added … “I wish it was easier to distinguish good intent, like I want to design a new drug for a disease, versus negative intent, which is I want to design a tool of bioterrorism.”

Bill’s comments — which include a plea for lawmakers to regulate the new technology — come amid a flurry of concern about the future of A.I. in the past month.

This conversation comes weeks after A.I. whistleblower Jacob Coxon came forward warning there was a 10% chance of an A.I.-caused apocalypse … shortly before OpenAI revealed several alarming instances of the technology’s hacking capabilities — and Sen. Bernie Sanders introduced a bill to ban of all artificial superintelligence.