EU AI Act Approved by European Parliament
Summary
On March 13, 2024, the European Parliament voted to approve the new groundbreaking, sector-agnostic EU AI Act, which has extraterritorial reach. The Act prohibits the use of certain AI systems and (among other things) imposes strict obligations on high-risk AI systems and on General Purpose AI systems and models, with the aim to reduce risk of harm to health, safety and fundamental rights, as well as to protect democracy, the rule of law and environmental sustainability. The obligations impact a wide range of stakeholders in the AI value chain, including providers, deployers, importers, distributors and others.
The Act must now undergo a final lawyer-linguist check and will require a final endorsement by the European Council. Hailing the vote, the EU’s internal market commissioner, Thierry Breton, stated, “I welcome the overwhelming support from the European Parliament for the EU AI Act . . . Europe is now a global standard-setter in trustworthy AI.”
