Europe: Members of the European Parliament (MEP) have approved the Artificial Intelligence (AI) Act, which ensures safety and respect for fundamental rights while promoting innovation.
This AI Law is intended to protect fundamental rights, democracy, the rule of law, and environmental sustainability from high-risk AI while promoting invention and positioning Europe as an AI leader. As an outcome of this rule, AI is subject to obligations that are determined by its level of risk and impact.
The new laws bar specific AI applications that endanger citizens’ rights, including biometric categorisation systems based on sensitive characteristics that indiscriminately scrape faces from the Internet or CCTV footage. In schools and workplaces AI that influences human behaviour or exploits people’s susceptibility will also be excluded, including emotion recognition, social scoring, and predictive policing.
The use of biometric identification systems (RBI) by law enforcement is restricted under regulation, except in precisely listed and narrowly specified cases. ‘Real-time’ RBI can only be deployed if strict protection measures are met.
Special prior judicial or administrative permission is required for its use in a specific time frame and geographical area. The use of such procedures ‘post-facto or post-remote RBI’ is believed to be a high-risk service case and needs judicial authorisation with criminal liability.
General-purpose AI (GPAI) systems and GPAI models based on them must meet specific transparency conditions, including compliance with EU copyright law and issuing precise overviews of the content used for training. More robust GPAI models that may pose systemic threats face additional requirements, including operating model validations, assessing and mitigating systemic risks and reporting on incidents.
During the plenary debate, the Internal Market Committee co-rapporteur Brando Benifei said that, “We finally have the world’s first binding law on artificial intelligence, to reduce risks, create opportunities, combat discrimination, and bring transparency. Thanks to Parliament, unacceptable AI practices will be banned in Europe and the rights of workers and citizens will be protected. The AI Office will now be set up to support companies to start complying with the rules before they enter into force. We ensured that human beings and European values are at the very centre of AI’s development.”
Civil Liberties Committee co-rapporteur, Dragos Tudorache stated that, “The EU has delivered. We have linked the concept of artificial intelligence to the fundamental values that form the basis of our societies. However, much work lies ahead that goes beyond the AI Act itself. AI will push us to rethink the social contract at the heart of our democracies, our education models, labour markets, and the way we conduct warfare. The AI Act is a starting point for a new model of governance built around technology. We must now focus on putting this law into practice.”
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