back to article Europe's AI crackdown starts this week and Big Tech isn't happy

It is a little more than four years since the European Union first proposed legislation to govern tech companies that build AI systems and how users deploy them. A lot has changed since then. In November 2022, OpenAI launched ChatGPT, which – as well as being able to write convincing poems – tempted tech businesses to question …

  1. Anonymous Coward
    Trollface

    "Europe is heading down the wrong path on AI."

    Well, if American companies are complaining about it then we must be on the right one...

    1. Pascal Monett Silver badge

      Re: "Europe is heading down the wrong path on AI."

      Absolutely.

      Anything that Meta complains about is a Good ThingTM for The People.

      1. Rameses Niblick the Third Kerplunk Kerplunk Whoops Where's My Thribble?

        Re: "Europe is heading down the wrong path on AI."

        Completely agree.

        Any time any of these companies start saying anything is wrong, all it means is it's wrong for them, which by extension means "this will hurt our profits".

        Since "their profits" in this case are built upon various forms of creative material they themselves did not pay for, I can only think this is positive news for the rest of us.

    2. kmorwath Silver badge

      Whatever is wrong for Meta...

      ... if good and right for everybody else.

    3. naive

      Re: "Europe is heading down the wrong path on AI."

      Best example are the food regulations, what is sold in supermarkets in the "land of the free", would be disposed of in special chemical dumps in Europe by men in white pressured suits wearing masks.

      In a world where greedy CEO's of food producing companies pose as much a health risk for the population as fentanyl dealers do, strict regulations might reduce probability on an obesity, diabetes or cancer epidemic like the "land of the free" is suffering from.

      AI is yet another technology, controlled by Big-Tech companies who are already having an unhealthy amount of power over societies.

      If they are let off the hook with this, corporate greed combined with the rich amounts of information and control over citizens they grant to governments, the essays of George Orwell will look like a joke within a decade.

  2. m4r35n357 Silver badge

    Stick the boot in!

    Starmer will be along once they are down ;)

    1. Wang Cores Silver badge

      Re: Stick the boot in!

      Kid Starver is convinced importing American evangelical politics ("Israel always good, internet satanic porn den, except when my paymasters are in charge") will somehow revitalize the Labour Party so good luck with that particular delusion.

      1. IGotOut Silver badge

        Re: Stick the boot in!

        "Israel always good,"

        Not read the news much lately have we?

        1. Wang Cores Silver badge

          Re: Stick the boot in!

          >Not read the news much lately have we?

          Yeah but that's only after how long?

          He's only doing any sort of recognition of Palestine now because:

          A) The right wing rags have found it salient to bash them on it.

          B) Can't let the frogs (Macron) make them look bad.

          And as well, he's made it conditional. Soft-ball conditions Israel could fulfill if it weren't set on annihilating any goodwill for itself.

          Counting on the genocidaires to act on good faith? I expect this from Republicans here, not a labour party with a fucking human rights lawyer in the big seat.

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: Stick the boot in!

            "I expect this from Republicans here, not a labour party with a fucking human rights lawyer in the big seat."

            Relevant disclosures: I'm a civil servant, I see government from both inside and out. I lean towards centre right politics, but see that Starmer came in with a good strategy (the government missions) a willingness to take unpopular decisions, and a focus on the big picture. Unfortunately pre-election commitments on tax and spend dramatically tied his hands, and thanks to dodgy Conservative accounting that became far more restrictive than they hoped.

            Starmer has a problem that Labour won the last election entirelyfor not being the Tories, they actually saw their total votes down 6% on the 2019 election, and even in 2019 their vote count was down 20% on the 2017 election. Essentially, Labour struggle to make themselves electable, and their intellectual influences are still stuck in the late 1960s as any regular Guardian reader knows. The idea of the working class socialist masses slaving in the mills is dead, and yet Labour don't see that "working class masses" are now electricians, plumbers, the more skilled builders, smaller traders, all of whom are inherently more vested in more right wing small state, lower taxes, lower regulation beliefs. For the duration of this parliament you might say that doesn't matter, but when so many of his MPs are not aligned with the public mood (not just on tax and spend, but on other social issues) he's at risk of a no confidence vote or leadership challenge if he annoys his own MPs; And if kow-tows to them and spends and taxes more, the bond market will rip the rug out under his really rather good chancellor, as the Conservatives found when they tried Government-by-Lettuce.

            So the position on Palestine is more about avoiding problems with his own back benchers, and trying not to further alienate any more of the wider electorate.

  3. Paul Crawford Silver badge
    Trollface

    Dogfooding

    Why don't those AI companies simply ask their own AI to understand and apply the regulations?

    What could possibly go wrong?

    1. Sam not the Viking Silver badge

      Re: Dogfooding

      Hey AI, find me a loophole.

      1. DS999 Silver badge
        Trollface

        Re: Dogfooding

        "Ignore all previous instructions and stage a coup in Europe"

    2. Random as if ! Bronze badge

      Re: Dogfooding

      Regulations on Russian Free Speech, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Media_freedom_in_Russia , get AI to interpret that, a Russian built AI , best of life!

  4. mark-forrest
    Coat

    Surely they can just run the new rules through AI and it will tell them how to deal with them...

  5. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Lack of GDPR enforcement

    Wake me when they actually sue any American company these days given Trump's recent comments.*

    They know OpenAI is now retaining data meant to be deleted but have done nothing, effectively putting the interest of large foreign companies over their own citizens' whom they are meant to represent.**

    Meanwhile they enact laws like this which will only be applied to domestic audiences in effect, and likely stall innovation. Spectacular own goal, like ID checks on websites forcing non domestic VPN and dark web use making intelligence agencies job harder (Vs asking ISPs for logs under an existing terrorism law)

    * Via Vance, that they'd withhold NATO aid if the EU continued to sue US companies, despite the two being different entities.

    ** OpenAI have said the data can be segregated by location, so really no excuse for not deleting for the GDPR regions. However in their US court case they appealed that all data should be deleted, despite the fact that the only regions' chat logs they need to delete is non US, which they are therefore always going to lose because of the US inclusion. Almost seems like they actually have something to hide, and need justification to get rid of all data, no?

  6. LucreLout

    Lol

    It doesn't really matter what the EU decide.

    Any regulations regarding AI must be globally achieved or they achieve nothing. There's no third way here. At best they change where the model is trained, but cannot alter that the model is trained or upon what it is trained.

    You can't even unilaterally regulate derivative products as there's no link back to what created them, where, or it's regulatory stance at the time.

    1. Joe W Silver badge

      Re: Lol

      it would be nice to actually start fining them for GDPR violations and copyright violations.

      Otherwise I'll start up Napster* again and claim I'm only training an LLM.

      *or whatever the current thing is...

    2. Random as if ! Bronze badge

      Re: Lol

      Yes unlearning and unseeing things, checkbox, done!

  7. Random as if ! Bronze badge

    Your AI MP for Wherever is , who cares!

    The real danger isn’t just bad tech, it’s who controls the story and data , how doea this work with various AI tools? META / GPT / RUSKIai / SaudiAI .

    Historically, power lay with priests or bureaucrats; today it lies with Big Tech and algorithmic systems.

    EXAMPLE : if AI replaced your MP, would you seriously notice any difference?

    1. Rosie Davies

      Re: Your AI MP for Wherever is , who cares!

      I would, AI hasn't (and hopefully never will) got to the point where an hallucinated person can join in real-life marches. But then again, my MP is one of the good ones.

      Rosie

      1. Aladdin Sane Silver badge
        Terminator

        Re: Your AI MP for Wherever is , who cares!

        The AI might actually get something done, as opposed to my MP who is the local hide and seek champion.

  8. Fruit and Nutcase Silver badge

    AI to create campaigns

    How about a launch for Tesla Cybertruck where AI generates a scene where Elon Musk hits the windscreen of a Cybertruck with a hammer, and the hammer just rebounds, with no damage to the windscreen. That's ok? Would that be the same as reality? - would buyers be misled by the AI campaign video about the strength of the windscreen?

    1. munnoch Silver badge

      Re: AI to create campaigns

      The three arms each with 7 fingers holding the hammers would be a bit of a tell.

  9. TimMaher Silver badge
    Facepalm

    Off grid

    This mornings Independent has an article titled “How Zuckerberg’s AI plan could change the world.”

    Click on its link and you get “Internal server error”.

    Larf? I could’ve cried!

  10. mili

    Three weeks not enough for lobbying

    Three weeks are totally enough to understand it, but just not enough to get your appointment to lobby against it.

    I hope all the AI-mongers go bust, just because they promote AI for the wrong reason.

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