What is the AI Act and how does it work?
The AI Act takes a “risk-based” approach to products or services using artificial intelligence and focuses on regulating AI uses rather than the technology itself. The legislation is designed to protect democracy, the rule of law, and fundamental rights such as freedom of expression, while encouraging investment and innovation.
The greater the risk posed by an AI application, the stricter the rules. Applications that pose limited risks, such as content recommendation systems or spam filters, must follow lighter rules, like disclosing that they rely on AI.
High-risk systems, such as medical devices, face stricter requirements, such as using high-quality data and providing clear information to users.
Some uses of AI have been banned because they are considered to pose unacceptable risks, such as social scoring systems that govern people’s behavior, certain types of predictive policing, and emotion recognition systems in schools and workplaces.
People in public places cannot have their faces scanned by police using remote biometric recognition systems powered by AI, except for serious crimes like kidnapping or terrorism.
The AI Act will only come into force two years after its final approval by European lawmakers, which is expected to happen in a rubber-stamp vote in early 2024. Violations could lead to fines of up to €35 million ($38 million) or 7% of the company’s total global revenue.
How does the AI Act affect the rest of the world?
The AI Act will apply to nearly 450 million people in the European Union, but experts say its impact could be felt far beyond through Brussels’ leading role in setting rules that act as a global standard.
The EU has played this role before with previous tech regulations, notably by imposing a common charging port that forced Apple to abandon its Lightning cable.
While many other countries are trying to figure out whether and how to regulate AI, the comprehensive regulations from the EU are poised to serve as a model.
“The AI Act is the first comprehensive, horizontal, binding regulation on AI that will not only be specific to Europe but will significantly contribute to the global momentum for AI regulation across different jurisdictions,” said Anu Bradford, a professor at Columbia Law School and an expert in European law and digital regulation.
She added, “It places the EU in a unique position to lead the way and show the world that AI can be regulated and that its development can be subject to democratic oversight.”
Amnesty International stated that even what the law does not do could have global ramifications.
By not pursuing a complete ban on live facial recognition, Brussels has “endorsed dark digital surveillance across 27 EU member states, setting a devastating precedent globally,” according to Amnesty International.
Amnesty International also described the failure of lawmakers to ban the export of AI technologies that could harm human rights, including their use in social scoring systems, which China employs to reward state obedience through surveillance.
What are other countries doing regarding AI regulation?
The United States and China, the two largest powers in AI, have begun to set their own rules.
U.S. President Joe Biden signed a comprehensive executive order on AI in October, which is expected to be bolstered by legislation and global agreements.
It requires leading AI developers to share safety testing results and other information with the government. Agencies will set standards to ensure the safety of AI tools before public release and issue guidance to describe AI-generated content.
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President Biden ordered on voluntary commitments made by major tech companies like Amazon, Google, Meta, and Microsoft to ensure the safety of their products before launching them.
On the other hand, China issued “temporary measures” for managing generative artificial intelligence, which apply to texts, images, audio, video, and other content created for individuals within China.
President Xi Jinping also proposed a global initiative for AI governance, calling for an open and fair environment for AI development.
How will the AI law affect ChatGPT?
The remarkable rise in popularity of OpenAI’s ChatGPT showcased that technology is making significant progress, compelling European policymakers to update their proposals.
The AI law includes provisions for chatbots and other general AI systems capable of performing various tasks, ranging from poetry composition to video creation and computer coding.
Officials adopted a two-tiered approach, with most general systems facing primary requirements for transparency, such as disclosing data governance details and the amount of energy consumed to train the models on massive datasets of written works and images sourced from the internet.
They also need to comply with EU copyright law and summarize the content they used for training.
Tighter rules await advanced AI systems with the highest computational power, which present “systemic risks” that officials aim to curb from spreading to services built by other software developers.
This article was written by Kelvin Chan and updated at [hour]:[minute] [AMPM] [timezone], [monthFull] [day], [year].
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