EU lawmakers reach preliminary agreement on an AI law

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Lawmakers from the European Union (EU) have reached a preliminary agreement on the European Artificial Intelligence (AI) Act, a groundbreaking regulation and guideline for the governance of AI within the territory.

Speaking to the news agency Reuters, Svenja Hahn, European Parliament deputy, said that the committee reached "a solid compromise" between "conservative wishes for more surveillance and leftist fantasies of over-regulation" and believed the new act would "regulate AI proportionately, protect citizens' rights, as well as foster innovation and boost the economy".

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The commission pitched the draft rules two years ago to draw up guidelines that protect the citizen's rights from emerging AI technologies. The draft will now be discussed by EU lawmakers and member countries.

Under the new guidelines, AI companies like OpenAI that make generative tools like ChatGPT would need to disclose all copyrighted material within their systems.

The new rules also classify AI technologies according to various risk levels, from minimal, limited, high and unacceptable. AI tools given a high-risk rating will not be banned but would need to disclose their data collection policies publicly.

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Across the Atlantic, the United States Senate Intelligence Committee has urged top technology companies to prioritise security measures and roll out new AI technologies responsibly.

"Beyond industry commitments, however, it is also clear that some level of regulation is necessary in this field," Democratic Senator Mark Warner told Reuters. Warner has also sent letters to the CEOs of OpenAI, Scale AI, Meta, Google, Apple, Stability AI, Midjourney, Anthropic, Percipient.ai and Microsoft.