ΑΙhub.org
 

European Commission releases white paper on artificial intelligence


by
21 February 2020



share this:

On Wednesday 19th February the European Commission released a white paper entitled: On Artificial Intelligence – A European approach to excellence and trust. This document forms part of the EU’s digital strategy, which aims to make the AI and data transformation work for people and businesses, while helping to achieve its target of a climate-neutral Europe by 2050.

With their strategies for AI and data, the EU aim to encourage businesses to work with, and develop, new technologies, while at the same time making sure that they earn citizens’ trust. Here is the opening to the white paper:

Artificial Intelligence is developing fast. It will change our lives by improving healthcare (e.g. making diagnosis more precise, enabling better prevention of diseases), increasing the efficiency of farming, contributing to climate change mitigation and adaptation, improving the efficiency of production systems through predictive maintenance, increasing the security of Europeans, and in many other ways that we can only begin to imagine. At the same time, Artificial Intelligence (AI) entails a number of potential risks, such as opaque decision-making, gender-based or other kinds of discrimination, intrusion in our private lives or being used for criminal purposes.

Against a background of fierce global competition, a solid European approach is needed, building on the European strategy for AI presented in April 2018. To address the opportunities and challenges of AI, the EU must act as one and define its own way, based on European values, to promote the development and deployment of AI.

The Commission is committed to enabling scientific breakthrough, to preserving the EU’s technological leadership and to ensuring that new technologies are at the service of all Europeans – improving their lives while respecting their rights…

…the Commission supports a regulatory and investment oriented approach with the twin objective of promoting the uptake of AI and of addressing the risks associated with certain uses of this new technology. The purpose of this White Paper is to set out policy options on how to achieve these objectives.

The white paper does not contain specific details about how AI technologies will be regulated, rather signals the start of a process that could lead to new legislation. The Commission needs more time to examine the multitude of complex issues relating to regulation and plans to advance carefully.

You can read the full document here. The European Commission have opened a public consultation on the matter and this will run until until 19 May 2020.

Watch European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen unveil the strategy:

Further documentation, including factsheets and communications can be found on the European Commission webpage.




Lucy Smith is Senior Managing Editor for AIhub.
Lucy Smith is Senior Managing Editor for AIhub.




            AIhub is supported by:


Related posts :



Forthcoming machine learning and AI seminars: July 2025 edition

  30 Jun 2025
A list of free-to-attend AI-related seminars that are scheduled to take place between 1 July and 31 August 2025.
monthly digest

AIhub monthly digest: June 2025 – gearing up for RoboCup 2025, privacy-preserving models, and mitigating biases in LLMs

  26 Jun 2025
Welcome to our monthly digest, where you can catch up with AI research, events and news from the month past.

RoboCupRescue: an interview with Adam Jacoff

  25 Jun 2025
Find out what's new in the RoboCupRescue League this year.

Making optimal decisions without having all the cards in hand

Read about research which won an outstanding paper award at AAAI 2025.

Exploring counterfactuals in continuous-action reinforcement learning

  20 Jun 2025
Shuyang Dong writes about her work that will be presented at IJCAI 2025.

What is vibe coding? A computer scientist explains what it means to have AI write computer code − and what risks that can entail

  19 Jun 2025
Until recently, most computer code was written, at least originally, by human beings. But with the advent of GenAI, that has begun to change.

Gearing up for RoboCupJunior: Interview with Ana Patrícia Magalhães

  18 Jun 2025
We hear from the organiser of RoboCupJunior 2025 and find out how the preparations are going for the event.

Interview with Mahammed Kamruzzaman: Understanding and mitigating biases in large language models

  17 Jun 2025
Find out how Mahammed is investigating multiple facets of biases in LLMs.



 

AIhub is supported by:






©2025.05 - Association for the Understanding of Artificial Intelligence


 












©2025.05 - Association for the Understanding of Artificial Intelligence