Ireland's Data Protection Commission (DPC) has reportedly blocked Google's launch of generative artificial intelligence (AI) service Bard in the EU due to privacy concerns.
Google launched Bard earlier this year in the US, UK and 178 other countries. However, it has been unable to crack the EU so far. The Mountain View, California-based company was reportedly planning to remediate the week of June 13, but those plans have been halted, as Politico reports.
According to the report, DPC deputy commissioner Graham Doyle said Google had only recently notified the commission of its intention to launch Bard in the EU this week. He went on to explain that Google had not provided the committee with "any detailed briefing, nor had it seen a data protection impact assessment or any supporting documentation." As a result, Doyle said, "Bard is not rolling out this week right now." The EU's approach to AI regulation is said to be far stricter than its neighbors, the UK and the US.
European data protection chief Wojciech Wiewiórowski previously quipped that "the definition of hell is European legislation vs. US law enforcement" after OpenAI's ChatGPT was recently banned in Italy over privacy concerns. Google appears to find itself in a similar situation with EU regulators. Notably, ChatGPT was finally approved for use in Italy after OpenAI addressed privacy concerns from regulators.
The EU's push to increase regulation of AI technologies stems from the EU AI Bill, a proposed framework for AI regulation in the EU due in May 2023. Its drafters seek to align the governance of AI technologies with the General Data Protection Regulation, a comprehensive set of rules designed to protect citizens' privacy.
Much like crypto asset market legislation, the EU's AI bill appears to place very different requirements on companies operating in the EU than those operating in the UK or the US, including a greater emphasis on security, privacy and accountability.
