The EU Parliament gives its okay for stricter rules for artificial intelligence (AI) in the European Union. The majority of parliamentarians in Strasbourg voted for a corresponding law.
According to Parliament, this is the world’s first AI law. Accordingly, AI systems should be divided into different risk groups in the future. The higher the potential dangers of an application, the higher the requirements should be.
Artificial intelligence usually refers to applications based on machine learning, in which software sifts through large amounts of data for matches and draws conclusions from them. They are already being used in many areas. For example, such programs can evaluate images from computer tomographs faster and with greater accuracy than humans. Self-driving cars also try to predict the behavior of other road users. And chatbots or automatic playlists from streaming services also work with AI.
The current law is based on a proposal from the EU Commission from 2021. Systems that are considered particularly risky and are used, for example, in critical infrastructure or in education and healthcare must therefore meet strict requirements.
Certain AI applications that violate EU values should be banned entirely. This includes, for example, the evaluation of social behavior (“social scoring”). This divides citizens in China into behavioral categories. And there should be no emotion recognition in the workplace or in educational institutions in the EU.
Facial recognition in public spaces – for example through video surveillance in public places – should generally not be permitted. However, there are exceptions: Police and other security authorities should be allowed to use such facial recognition in public spaces to prosecute very specific crimes such as human trafficking or terrorism.
With the approval of Parliament, the regulations can now come into force. Negotiators from the European Parliament and EU countries had previously reached an agreement on regulation in December after long negotiations. At the beginning of February, representatives of the EU states also formally agreed to the proposal. For the member states, this now means that they must first gradually decommission banned systems.
After two years, all points of the law should be fully implemented. For example, member states must decide on sanctions if companies do not comply with the regulations. These can include fines. Private individuals who discover violations of the rules can complain to national authorities. They can then initiate monitoring procedures and, if necessary, impose penalties.