Europe has taken the lead. It is legislating a law on Artificial Intelligence that must begin to be implemented by the end of 2026 throughout the European Union territory. European parliamentarians argue something about the "rights of their citizens". It's worth delving into this for a moment:
Do we have the right as individuals for AI systems used in the EU to be safe, transparent, traceable, non-discriminatory, and respectful to the environment? The EU believes so.
It seems we also have the right not to be cognitively manipulated.
We have the right not to be socially scored, not to be classified based on our behavior or personal characteristics. And not to be biometrically identified.
We have the right to honor and to receive truthful information, not to be deceived, and also for our image not to be impersonated by others. So very soon, companies that use generative AI will have to publicly disclose it.
And we also have rights over our intellectual property, which means summaries of copyrighted data used for training will also have to be published.
We have the right to know, without any doubt, when we are interacting with AI. This includes AI systems that generate or manipulate image, audio, or video content.
Although it might not have been too obvious that a consumer has the right to know if a commercial brand is using communications made by machines to maximize its results, the companies owning those brands will have to ensure that their communications do not violate fundamental human rights such as honor and personal image. It is worth remembering that voice is an inalienable part of a person's image rights.
Computational capacity is developing exponentially and it seems that the analog genetic evolution that resulted in humans draws a much more linear curve. It appears that both curves will have to converge at some point: our rights. Because it seems that we do have some. And Europeans will be the first to be able to legally defend them.
