Europe’s First Rules on Artificial Intelligence

The European Union (EU) has begun to claim its place at the frontier of law making and artificial intelligence (AI). Its Parliament recently passed a draft of the AI Act, which would be the “world’s first rules” on AI. 

The European Parliament describes its proposed rules as furthering a “risk-based approach,” which is aligned with goals of safety, transparency and innovation. The Act is concerned with ensuring that AI is developed in a manner that is “human-centric and ethical.” 

The suggested legislative scheme is said to be expansive in scope. Its regulations are intended to impact the use of AI technologies with risk metrics described as spanning from “minimal” to “unacceptable". The proposed regulations may safeguard AI use by clarifying the “requirements for high-risk AI systems” and providing provisions that “increase transparency and allow users' complaints.”

While this draft of the AI Act is only the first step in a longer process, the EU has expressed an “ambitious target to reach an agreement on the law by the end of the year.”

The EU’s proposed regulations may be inspiring other countries to enact their own AI legislation. Recently the United States Congress was presented with a framework on how to regulate AI so as “to adopt guardrails” on the quickly evolving and complex technologies.