AI Act ‘very likely the most important piece of legislation’ in technology sector, says EBO.ai CEO

EBO.ai CEO and artificial intelligence (AI) specialist Gege Gatt on Tuesday touted the European Union’s (EU) new AI Act as “very likely the most important piece of legislation” within the technology sector.

European Parliament lawmakers on Wednesday passed the landmark legislation, that will classify all AI under four levels of risk, from minimal to unacceptable. Technology that is deemed to be an unacceptable risk, such as systems that judge people based on their behaviour, would be banned, while AI focused on vulnerable populations, like children, would face higher scrutiny.

The AI Act was first proposed in 2021, yet negotiations were accelerated over past months following the release of ChatGPT. Members of European Parliament (MEPs) will now analyse the details further with EU countries before it becomes legislation.

The next steps are negotiations between European Parliament and European Council on the final form of the law, which commenced on Thursday (today).

“Given the profound transformative impact AI will have on our societies and economies, the EU’s AI ACT is very likely the most important piece of legislation in this sector,” Dr Gatt said, before the legislation was passed.

He explained that once it is approved, the legislation will contain “the world’s first rules on AI” with a “broad extraterritorial scope”, as it will govern both AI systems “operating in the EU as well as foreign systems whose output enters the EU market”.

Dr Gatt also recently spoke at the Malta IT Law Association’s (MITLA) Annual Conference titled “Digital Safeguards”, during which he remarked that his thesis is that “current generations are not being defined by cultural events”, but rather are “mediated, and largely shaped by the technologies they have access to”.

He added that “thinking” therefore is “not something we do biologically in our brain”, but rather that which we do “with the extended tools attached to it”, therefore including technology and more specifically, AI.

Aside from being Co-Founder and CEO at AI product EBO.ai, Dr Gatt has also been Director at technology company ICON for 24 years, Vice President at MITLA for nine years, and a Board Member at the Humanity 2.0 Foundation for over four years, and is also a Specialist Examiner (ICT Law Doctoral Thesis) at University of Malta.