Context

European Union lawmakers gave final approval to a landmark law governing artificial intelligence (AI) to limit its use in businesses and organizations in Europe for everything from health care decisions to policing.

1: Dimension- Need of AI Act

• The rapid rise in AIhas created many opportunities globally. However, these rapid changes also raise profound concerns.
  • Concerns related to AI: Privacy, Transparency, Accountability, Job Disruption, Safety, Inequality, Manipulation and Disinformation, Human Dignity and Autonomy, Cultural and Social Impact, Environmental Impact.
• The AI Act can make AI trust worthy.

2: Dimension- Objectives of the EU AI Act

• The Act is the world’s first major set of regulatory ground rules to govern the mediatized AI at the forefront of tech investment.
• The main idea of the law is to regulate AI based on its capacity to cause harm to society. The higher the risk, the stricter the rules.
• The first-of-its-kind law imposes blanket-bans some “unacceptable” uses of the technology while enacting stiff guardrails for other applications deemed “high-risk.”
  • Areas of high-risk: Critical infrastructure, education and vocational training, employment, essential services such as healthcare or banking, as well as law enforcement, migration and border management, justice, and democratic processes.
• The EU AI Act outlaws social scoring systems powered by AI and any biometric-based tools used to guess a person’s race, political leanings or sexual orientation.
• It also bans the use of AI to interpret the emotions of people in schools and workplaces, as well as some types of automated profiling intended to predict a person’s likelihood of committing future crimes.
• The law further outlines a separate category of ‘high-risk’ uses of AI, particularly for education, hiring and access to government services, and imposes a separate set of transparency and other obligations on them.
• It also requires all AI-generated deepfakes to be clearly labelled, targeting concerns about manipulated media that could lead to disinformation and election meddling.

3: Dimension- EU's Landmark AI Law and the "Brussels Effect"

• Impact on India: The final approval could have significant implications for India, particularly in terms of global regulatory standards and market access.
  • The "Brussels Effect" phenomenon, whereby EU regulations become de facto global standards, may compel multinational companies operating in India to comply with the EU AI Act in order to access the lucrative EU market.
  • This could prompt India to consider aligning its own AI regulations with the EU standards to maintain competitiveness and facilitate international trade.
• Regulatory Void in India's Surveillance Systems: India's current deployment of surveillance systems, including facial recognition technology, lacks adequate regulatory oversight, raising concerns about potential privacy violations and discriminatory practices.
  • While India has historically pursued independent legislative efforts, it has drawn inspiration from international regulations like the GDPR.
  • The EU's AI Act may serve as a benchmark for India as it navigates the development of its own regulatory framework for emerging technologies, including AI and surveillance systems.