Italy first in EU to pass comprehensive law regulating use of AI

The contents of the law, according to the article:

The bill introduces prison sentences of between one and five years for the illegal spreading of AI-generated or manipulated content if it causes harm.

There will also be harsher penalties for using the technology to commit crimes, including fraud and identity theft, and stricter transparency and human oversight rules governing how the technology is used in workplaces as well as in a range of sectors such as healthcare, education, justice and sport.

children under the age of 14 will need parental consent to access AI.

When it comes to copyright, the law stipulates that works created with AI assistance are protected if they originate from genuine intellectual effort, while AI-driven text and data mining will only be permitted for non-copyrighted content or scientific research by authorised institutions.

The law authorises up to €1bn (£870m) from a state-backed venture capital fund to support companies active in AI, cybersecurity and telecommunications, although critics argue the sum is small compared with investments being made by the US and China.

I don't know the italian legal system very well, but I would have expected that laws regarding fraud, identity theft etc would already be sufficient so no special treatment of AI in this context should be necessary.

The copyright related data mining part is interesting though. Wouldn't that hinder the development of commercial AI applications or is there a licensing system in place?

Furthermore I wonder how "genuine intellectual effort" is defined. Even before LLMs, image generators and alike, a lot of stuff has received copyrights that one might not consider "genuine intellectual effort". Where is the line drawn?

6 comments

The contents of the law, according to the article:
The bill introduces prison sentences of between one and five years for the illegal spreading of AI-generated or manipulated content if it causes harm.
There will also be harsher penalties for using the technology to commit crimes, including fraud and identity theft, and stricter transparency and human oversight rules governing how the technology is used in workplaces as well as in a range of sectors such as healthcare, education, justice and sport.
children under the age of 14 will need parental consent to access AI.
When it comes to copyright, the law stipulates that works created with AI assistance are protected if they originate from genuine intellectual effort, while AI-driven text and data mining will only be permitted for non-copyrighted content or scientific research by authorised institutions.
The law authorises up to €1bn (£870m) from a state-backed venture capital fund to support companies active in AI, cybersecurity and telecommunications, although critics argue the sum is small compared with investments being made by the US and China.
I don't know the italian legal system very well, but I would have expected that laws regarding fraud, identity theft etc would already be sufficient so no special treatment of AI in this context should be necessary.
The copyright related data mining part is interesting though. Wouldn't that hinder the development of commercial AI applications or is there a licensing system in place?
Furthermore I wonder how "genuine intellectual effort" is defined. Even before LLMs, image generators and alike, a lot of stuff has received copyrights that one might not consider "genuine intellectual effort". Where is the line drawn?
- The line is drawn on ~~how much you bribe us~~ how much can be copied without ever looking at it.
- The limit of data mining to only legal sources will kill any AI use. US has a huge line of lawsuits in SDNY against AI companies scraping stolen data.
- The copyright related data mining part is interesting though. Wouldn’t that hinder the development of commercial AI applications or is there a licensing system in place?
  That's the EU-wide situation. You can tell that the EU is just not building an AI industry.
  It's not just neo-fascists ruining their countries. Though, at least for Germany, there is quite some connection between overreaching copyright and its dictatorial past.
  
  AI industry....good one. How's that working out so far? Maybe we will watch AI movies on our 3D TVs.