The adoption of the negotiating position by the European Parliament sets the stage for the trilogues between the EU institutions, while the European Commission is pushing for the AI Act to be finalised by the end of 2023. The European Parliament’s position on this legislative file reflects its members’ fundamental desire to make the EU a leader in AI regulation and innovation.

On May 17th, 2023, the European Data Protection Board (EDPB) published its final report on the use of facial recognition technologies (FRTs) by Law Enforcement Authorities (LEAs). This report opposes mass surveillance, and, according to the EDPB, ‘the use of facial recognition by law enforcement agencies must be necessary, limited, and proportionate’.

On May 16th, 2023, the French data control agency – Commission Nationale de l’Informatique et des Libertés (CNIL) – published an action plan aimed at ensuring respect for the privacy of people in relation to Artificial Intelligence (AI) systems and more specifically generative AI (e.g. Midjourney and ChatGPT from the company OpenAI). This action plan follows the 2017 CNIL’s first global approach on these new tools.  

Between 21 and 23 April, the European Commission (Commission) held the closing session of the European citizens’ panels, to debate and propose recommendations on virtual worlds in the EU. As a result, a panel of 150 citizens has contributed to the provision of 23 recommendations on ‘fair and human-centric virtual worlds in the EU’.

The European Consumer Organisation (BEUC) is calling ‘for EU and national authorities to launch an investigation into ChatGPT and similar chatbots’, following the filing of a complaint on March 30th, 2023, on the other side of the Atlantic by the Center for Artificial Intelligence and Digital Policy (CAIDP) in relation to ChatGPT-4.

On March 27th, 2023, the European Union Agency for Law and Enforcement Cooperation (EUROPOL) released a report on the Impact of Large Language Models on Law Enforcement. Having considered the outcomes that resulted from a series of workshops organised by the Europol Innovation Lab on how criminals can abuse LLMs such as ChatGPT, as well as how it may assist investigators in their daily work, the report provided useful recommendations on enhancing law enforcement preparedness.

On February 21th, 2023, the United States Copyright Office (USCO) cancelled the registration certificate previously issued to Ms. Kristina Kashtanova for the “comic book” entitled “Zarya of the Dawn”, considering that the images in the comic book are not the product of human authorship – since they were generated by an AI system – Midjourney – and were therefore not copyrightable.

Using innovative AI techniques, Berkeley’s researchers have analysed more than 2.5 million fully anonymized metaverse data recordings and found that individual users could be uniquely identified. The study stresses the need to enhance security and privacy awareness in relation to these platforms.

The legal and ethical risks that the use of ChatGPT poses, as well as the need to regulate the deployment of similar generative chatbots, is currently being debated across the world. The European Parliament is considering placing the use of generative AI models, such as ChatGPT, in a “high risk” category in its upcoming compromise text on the AI Act (Parliament Approach), thereby intending to subject such tools to burdensome conformity assessment requirements.

Are you interested in the societal impacts and major legal issues posed by the development of Artificial Intelligence and new technologies, including the Metaverse? Do you have a PhD in legal studies (preferably digital law, intellectual property law or European/International/Human Rights law)? Are you ready to dive into the issues that concern protection of personal data and privacy, freedom of expression and other human rights in the era of AI? Do you have an open and curious mind?

On February 16th, 2023, the First Senate of the Federal Constitutional Court arrived at the decision that Land Hesse’s and Hambourg’s legislation “authorising the police to process stored personal data through automated data analysis or automated data interpretation” is unconstitutional.

On February 2nd, 2023, the Italian Data Protection Agency (Garante Per La Protezione Dei Dati Personali) urgently ordered a temporary limitation “on the processing of personal data relating to users in the Italian territory as performed by Luka Inc., the US-based developer and operator of Replika, in its capacity as controller of the processing of personal data that is carried out via the said app”.