Henna Virkkunen

EU to Trump: We will keep pushing for global AI safety rules.

Matthew Pollitt and Peter Heck from Politico report that EU tech chief Henna Virkkunen has pledged to keep seeking an international agreement on AI security despite US resistance.

At the Raid Conference, she acknowledged Washington's opposition to international regulation on innovation grounds, but argued that pro-innovation regulation builds the trust on which innovation depends.

She praised the AI Act as a strong regulatory basis for tackling challenges posed by AI bots.

And I think we are entering a phase that will be crucial for the credibility of all this work and to actually be able to build a credible pathway for broader international cooperation.

You mentioned some of the recent incidents, and, uh, this is very interesting because I think I read that the European Commission Tech Chief, Henna Virkkunen, mentioned that over the summer, there were a number of incidents, which is why the European Commission decided to send a request for information to these top general-purpose AI model providers, OpenAI, Anthropic.

Uh, they don't-- They didn't mention who exactly, but, but we can assume that some of these companies that have been involved in, in some of the incidents.

And, and this is, this is also interesting that you mention how long this whole framework was developed over many years, and now arguably, the European Union is in a really good spot in terms of having built this framework because we are seeing some of the systemic risks that are mentioned in the code of practice, like, uh, cybersecurity-related incidents or loss of control.

Mm.

Um, so we'll be watching Ursula von der Leyen's, uh, State of the Union address tomorrow with interest, but also Thursday there will be more detail revealed, um, uh, by, uh, Ursula von der Leyen and Henna Virkkunen, and so I think that, you know, I hope we'll learn more as the week progresses.

Uh, are video-sharing platforms like YouTube included under the label o- of social media? And, you know, how do you enforce, say, under threes not having access to that? You know, if a parent opens up Cocomelon on YouTube so they can get through a plate of spaghetti, um-

Well, yeah, indeed.

They won't be just being left up to, you know, some of our larger platforms to say, "We'll do this, we'll do that, we'll do the other." It will be by design, and that design will be enforced.

By who?

By the, by the Commission and by the, um, Commission, Henna Virkkunen, actually, is the department that will look after it.

But it will be enforced under the law, which obviously will be ratified by each member state, and so therefore we'll have a European-wide approach.