\n<\/p>\n
The European Commission is considering plans to delay parts of the EU\u2019s Artificial Intelligence Act, after intense pressure from businesses and Donald Trump\u2019s administration.<\/p>\n
The commission confirmed that \u201ca reflection\u201d was \u201cstill ongoing\u201d on delaying aspects of the regulation, after media reports that Brussels was weighing up changes with the aim of easing demands on big tech companies.<\/p>\n
The act, the first comprehensive legislation in the world regulating AI, came into force in August 2024, but many of its provisions are yet to apply. Most obligations on companies developing high-risk AI systems that \u201cpose serious risks to health, safety or fundamental rights\u201d are not due to come into effect until August 2026 or a year after that.<\/p>\n
According to the Financial Times, the commission is considering giving a one-year \u201cgrace period\u201d to companies breaching the rules on the highest-risk AI.<\/p>\n
Providers of generative AI \u2013 systems that can produce content, such as text or images \u2013 who have already placed products on the market before the implementation date could be granted a one-year pause from the laws \u201cto provide sufficient time\u2009\u2009 \u2026 to adapt their practices within a reasonable time without disrupting the market\u201d, stated an internal document cited by the FT.<\/p>\n
The commission is also considering delays to imposing fines for violations of its new AI transparency rules until August 2027 to \u201cprovide sufficient time for adaptation of providers and deployers of AI systems\u201d to implement the obligations, the newspaper reported.<\/p>\n
Also being studied is greater flexibility for AI developers of high-risk systems over monitoring performance of products on the market, by allowing them to follow guidance that would be less prescriptive than the system originally envisaged, according to the specialist news site MLex, which first reported on the planned amendments to the act.<\/p>\n
The proposals could change before their expected release on 19 November. Once published, they would then have to be agreed by EU member states and the European parliament.<\/p>\n
The EU has come under repeated pressure from the Trump administration to weaken regulation of tech companies. The US president recently threatened to impose tariffs on countries with tech regulations or digital taxes that he deemed to be \u201cdesigned to harm or discriminate against American technology\u201d.<\/p>\n
Meta announced this year that it would not be signing the commission\u2019s code of practice for general-purpose AI models.<\/p>\n
\u201cEurope is heading down the wrong path on AI,\u201d wrote the company\u2019s chief global affairs officer, Joel Kaplan, who contended that the code introduced \u201clegal uncertainties\u201d for model developers, as well as measures that went \u201cfar beyond the scope of the AI Act\u201d.<\/p>\n
But it is not just US companies that have complained about Europe\u2019s regulation of the fast-evolving technology.<\/p>\n
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Sign up to Business Today<\/span><\/p>\n Get set for the working day \u2013 we’ll point you to all the business news and analysis you need every morning<\/p>\n Privacy Notice: <\/strong>Newsletters may contain information about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. If you do not have an account, we will create a guest account for you on theguardian.com to send you this newsletter. You can complete full registration at any time. For more information about how we use your data see our Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.<\/span><\/p>\n after newsletter promotion<\/p>\n Dozens of European companies have urged a two-year pause on the act to allow time for \u201creasonable implementation\u201d and \u201cfurther simplification of the new rules\u201d.<\/p>\n An open letter signed by the heads of 46 companies, including Airbus, Lufthansa and Mercedes-Benz, said such a delay would show innovators and investors that Europe was \u201cserious about its simplification and competitiveness agenda\u201d.<\/p>\n The European Commission spokesperson Thomas Regnier said: \u201cWhen it comes to potentially delaying the implementation of targeted parts of the AI Act, a reflection is still ongoing.\u201d No decision had been taken, he said, adding that the commission would \u201calways remain fully behind the AI Act and its objectives\u201d.<\/p>\n Regnier said Brussels had \u201cconstant contacts with our partners around the globe\u201d but it was not for a third country to decide how the EU legislated. \u201cThis is our sovereign right,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n Brando Benifei, an Italian Social Democrat involved in drafting the law, said he was deeply sceptical about reopening the AI Act before it was fully in force and without an impact assessment.<\/p>\n \u201cI strongly oppose any \u2018stop the clock\u2019 or delays that would only breed legal uncertainty and leave people exposed to risks the AI act was designed to address proportionately,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The European Commission is considering plans to delay parts of the EU\u2019s Artificial Intelligence Act, after intense pressure from businesses and Donald Trump\u2019s administration. The commission confirmed that \u201ca reflection\u201d was \u201cstill ongoing\u201d on delaying aspects of the regulation, after media reports that Brussels was weighing up changes with the aim of easing demands on<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":32612,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[56],"tags":[4308,1285,6999,715,4785,812,81,1183],"class_list":{"0":"post-32611","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-crime-justice","8":"tag-act","9":"tag-big","10":"tag-commission","11":"tag-european","12":"tag-pressure","13":"tag-tech","14":"tag-trump","15":"tag-water"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32611","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=32611"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32611\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/32612"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=32611"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=32611"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=32611"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}