On Tuesday, two crucial factions of lawmakers within the European Parliament approved a provisional agreement on groundbreaking artificial intelligence regulations. This precedes a crucial vote by the legislative assembly in April, marking a significant step towards the world’s inaugural legislation addressing AI technology. Referred to as the AI Act, these novel regulations seek to establish guidelines for a technology widely employed in diverse industries, including banking, automotive, electronics, airlines, security, and law enforcement.
Aimed at ensuring people’s safety, fundamental rights, and privacy, the legislation will require providers to assess their risks, including harm to health, human dignity, privacy, freedom, equality, the environment, democracy, and the rule of law. It will also force them to keep up-to-date technical documentation on their systems, including how they were trained and what decisions they are making. It will also make it easier for individuals to see what their data is being used for and to complain if they feel an AI system infringes on their rights.
The deal was reached after a long period of negotiations and some intense lobbying. Some of the biggest EU economies, particularly France, Germany, and Italy, were wary about a section of the proposal that brings smaller AI startups under regulation via regulations on foundational models, such as large language models, which could impose stricter rules on them than more prominent companies with more established businesses would face. The deal also contains some hotly debated provisions, such as a proposal to classify AI systems that are considered high-risk for causing harm and to require them to have stricter obligations in risk management, data governance, and technical documentation.
Despite the challenging debates, there is a significant common political will to move forward with regulating AI, especially at the EU level, according to Brando Benifei, co-rapporteur of the AI Act for Parliament’s Committee on Internal Market and Consumer Protection and Dragos Tudorache, lead negotiator from the European Conservatives and Reformists group. The next step will be to work out the agreement’s details with the Council and the European Commission. This will take several rounds of “trilogue” meetings, with both sides presenting their positions and negotiating in detail.
The legislation is expected to enter into force by the end of 2024, though the specifics of how it will be enforced will take some time to work out. It will then have to be incorporated into national laws and, as a regulation rather than a directive, will require implementing measures at the country level.
