Report from Reuters
In Brief – The EU Commission has announced proposals dubbed the “Digital Omnibus” aimed at simplifying AI and privacy regulations to promote European digital innovation and boost efforts to claw back ground against tech dominance by the US and China. Digital package highlights include delaying, from August 2026 to December 2027, the implementation of AI Act rules applied to “high risk” AI services such as healthcare and credit worthiness, exempting companies from registering AI systems in a database of high-risk systems if the tech is only used for narrow or procedural tasks, amending EU data privacy rules to ease the ability of companies to train AI models on European user data, and change the rules applying to online cookies to address so-called “cookie fatigue”. The proposal to clarify when user data stops being “personal” under the landmark GDPR privacy law to ease the ability of companies to use anonymous information from EU citizens for AI training drew condemnation from privacy advocates and other Big Tech critics. The commission proposals need to be approved by EU countries and the European Parliament before implementation. Henna Virkkunen, the lead EU Commissioner on tech policy, said Europe had fallen behind on technology and innovation and that objections from some that the plan is “not enough” and others that “there’s too much” shows that it is “a balanced package”.
Context – While increasingly vocal concerns over European Digital Sovereignty extend far beyond AI, the AI Act is a striking example of EU leading on regulation not innovation. In response, the Commission released an “AI Continent Action Plan” in April and two more AI initiatives in October. A recently leaked draft of the Digital Omnibus caused privacy advocates to react with alarm and charge that changes to the GDPR threatened people’s fundamental right to privacy, while privacy campaigner Max Schrems called the public unveiling a “panic reaction” by the European Commission and a giveaway to US tech giants, saying the changes mean that, “all your data is shoved into the algorithms of Meta, Google or Amazon.”