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Several recent news items on Apple’s and the EU Digital Markets Act prompted me to update my thoughts on Apple’s struggles with the European Commission and with other software developers. For my previous update, with links to earlier texts, see DMA workshops and privacy.

The EU’s data protection law, the GDPR, requires accuracy in processing personal data. However, generative AI—like large language models (LLM)—may “hallucinate” or reflect information that is false but widely spread. On one hand, inaccuracy may seem like an inherent feature of the technology.

The recent official publication of the EU Artificial Intelligence Act has left several fundamental debates on the legal status of AI in Europe unresolved. Two significant potential legal obstacles to AI development and use remain inadequately addressed: intellectual property and personal data protection laws.

The European Data Protection Board’s (EDPB) Nov. 5 stakeholder consultation on AI models and data protection—organized to gather input for an upcoming Irish Data Protection Commission opinion under Article 64(2) of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR)—showcased significant lingering disagreement on how the GDPR should apply to AI.

[First published on Truth on the Market on 12 August 2024] Google recently announced that it has changed its plans to phase out third-party cookies in the Chrome web browser. The company had previously planned to disable third-party cookies in Chrome, a change supported by many in the privacy-stakeholder community, but which was met with criticism from the adtech industry and competition lawyers.

Despite the official publication of the EU Artificial Intelligence Act, debates on the legal status of AI in Europe continue. Two significant potential legal obstacles for AI development and use remain inadequately addressed: intellectual property and privacy laws.

The “pay or OK” debate in the EU continues, and it is still unclear what its outcome will be, for Meta and everyone else. Today, the European Commission announced their preliminary finding that Meta’s approach is not compliant with the law.

I joined Eric Seufert on his Mobile Dev Memo podcast (link) once again, this time to discuss the EU EDPB opinion on “pay or OK” and “large online platforms,” which I speculated about in my “EU authorities on “pay or consent”: mid-April 2024 update.

Update 2: The EDPB opinion is now available in full. Update: According to Politico and MLex, the EDPB adopted the opinion I speculated about below. The headlines that this constitutes a prohibition on Meta’s paid subcriptions are misleading.

It’s been an eventful two weeks for those following the story of the European Union’s implementation of the Digital Markets Act. On April 18, the European Commission began a series of workshops with the companies designated as “gatekeepers” under the DMA: Apple, Meta, Alphabet, Amazon, ByteDance, and Microsoft.