European Parliament passes AI Act, challenging tech giants' power

Jillian Deutsch

The European Parliament voted to completely ban real-time, remote biometric surveillance — a decision that will put lawmakers at odds with the EU’s 27 countries in upcoming negotiations.  The blanket ban, which was previously agreed by lawmakers, was up in the air after a political deal fell apart late last week.
 

Lawmakers also passed additional measures for general purpose AI and foundational models like GPT-4. Under the parliament’s plan, companies such as OpenAI and Google would have to perform risk assessments and summarise the copyrighted material used to train their models — regardless of how they’re used. 
 

The parliament’s entire draft of the AI Act passed on Wednesday, paving the way for the so-called “trilogue” negotiations between the parliament, EU member states, and European Commission to start later on Wednesday. 
 

The commission wants a deal by the end of the year, after which the new AI Act rules could impact companies by 2026. In the meantime, officials like Executive Vice President Margrethe Vestager are pushing a “code of conduct” with companies that would be voluntary rules across the G7, plus India and Indonesia.
 

The provisions are a red line for a number of member states as they head into negotiations with the parliament and the European Commission. A few members of the center-right European People’s Party wanted to include exceptions for finding missing children and preventing terrorist attacks, but these amendments failed in the plenary vote on Wednesday.

Landmark Act

• Companies such as OpenAI and Google would have to perform risk assessments and summarise the copyrighted material used to train their models
• The new rules could impact firms by 2026
• Executives are also pushing a ‘code of conduct’ with companies that would be voluntary rules across the G7, plus India, Indonesia