EU Artificial Intelligence Act (AI Act)

The EU Artificial Intelligence Act (Regulation (EU) 2024/1689) sets risk-based rules for those who develop and deploy AI systems in the European Union. It entered into force on 1 August 2024 and became applicable on 2 August 2026, with some parts applying earlier or later.

Risk tiers. The Act bans AI practices considered a clear threat to people's safety, livelihoods and rights; most of those prohibitions took effect in February 2025. Uses that can pose serious risks, such as CV-sorting software for recruitment, are classed as high-risk and face strict obligations. After an amending "AI Omnibus" regulation entered into force on 27 July 2026, those rules apply from 2 December 2027 in areas such as employment and education, and from 2 August 2028 for AI built into regulated products. AI considered minimal or no risk, such as spam filters, gets no new rules.

Labelling AI-generated content. Providers of AI systems that generate synthetic audio, image, video or text must ensure the output is marked in a machine-readable format and detectable as artificially generated or manipulated. Deployers who use AI to create deep fakes must disclose that the content is artificial, as must those publishing AI-generated text to inform the public on matters of public interest, unless it has had human review and someone holds editorial responsibility. The Commission gives August 2026 as the start of these transparency rules, and points to a voluntary code of practice with icons for disclosing AI-generated images, audio and text.

General-purpose AI models. Obligations for providers of general-purpose AI models, including on transparency and copyright, have applied since 2 August 2025. Signatories of the Commission's General-Purpose AI Code of Practice include Anthropic, Google and Microsoft.

Penalties. Breaching the prohibitions can bring fines of up to €35 million or, for a company, 7% of total worldwide annual turnover, whichever is higher.