EU AI Act: Transparency Obligations and Fines for High-Impact General-Purpose Artificial Intelligence (GPAI) Systems

“The EU AI Act is a global first,” said European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen on X. “[It is] a unique legal framework for the development of AI you can trust. And for the safety and fundamental rights of people and businesses.”

According to the press release, negotiators established obligations for “high-impact” general-purpose AI (GPAI) systems that meet certain benchmarks, like risk assessments, adversarial testing, incident reports, and more. It requires transparency by the systems which include creating technical documents and “detailed summaries of the content used for training”, something companies like OpenAI have refused to do so far.

Citizens should have a right to complain about artificial intelligence systems and be given explanations about their decisions on high risk systems that affect their rights.

The press release didn’t go into detail about how all that would work or what the benchmarks are, but it did note a framework for fines if companies break the rules. They vary based on the violation and size of the company and can range from 35 million euros or 7 percent of global revenue, to 7.5 million euros or 1.5 percent of global revenue of turnover.

EU lawmakers want to make it illegal to use artificial intelligence in facial recognition, but governments are trying to find ways to use it. Late proposals from France, Germany, and Italy to allow makers of generative AI models to self-regulate are also believed to have contributed to the delays.

Negotiating Rules for Live Biometric Monitoring and General-Purpose Artificial Intelligence Systems in the Light of European Parliament Results on Open AI

The final deal is expected to be done before the end of the year. Even then, the law likely won’t come into force until 2025 at the earliest.

Now that a provisional agreement has been reached, more negotiations will still be required, including votes by Parliament’s Internal Market and Civil Liberties committees.

Negotiating rules for livebiometrics monitoring and general-purpose artificial intelligence models has been highly divisive. The announcement of the deal was delayed this week due to the continued debate over these, according to reports.

After months of debate about how to regulate companies like OpenAI, lawmakers from the EU’s three branches of government—the Parliament, Council, and Commission—spent more than 36 hours in total thrashing out the new legislation between Wednesday afternoon and Friday evening. Lawmakers were under pressure to strike a deal before the EU parliament election campaign starts in the new year.

The fines can be as high as 7 percent of the company’s global turnover. In 6 months, the ban on banned artificial intelligence will be in effect, followed by 12 months of transparency and two years of the full set of rules.

Measures designed to make it easier to protect copyright holders from generative AI and require general purpose AI systems to be more transparent about their energy use were also included.

“Europe has positioned itself as a pioneer, understanding the importance of its role as a global standard setter,” said European Commissioner Thierry Breton in a press conference on Friday night.