EU Moves Closer to Historic Rules on Regulating AI Technology

The European Union (EU) has moved closer to enacting one of the world’s first laws regulating artificial intelligence (AI) systems, including ChatGPT. Despite planning to introduce such a law in 2021, the EU’s concerns over ChatGPT’s impact led to further discussions. While AI has the potential to transform society, from healthcare and work to creative pursuits, Brussels is worried about its potential to undermine democracy, such as through the creation of authentic-looking deepfakes. Deepfakes are AI-generated images and audio created to deceive people. Eventually, the EU law will regulate AI based on the system’s risk, with higher-risk systems requiring greater scrutiny. The legislation is set to include a voluntary interim pact with tech companies in the interim. The EU parliament added new conditions for classification as high risk, which may limit AI development, according to the CCIA, a European industry lobby group representing tech giants. The final law could be passed before the end of the year, but would not come into force until 2026 at the earliest.