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EU Proposes New Copyright Rules for Generative AI

European Union flags fly outside the European Commission headquarters in Brussels, Belgium, March 1, 2023.REUTERS/Johanna Geron/File Photo
European Union flags fly outside the European Commission headquarters in Brussels, Belgium, March 1, 2023.REUTERS/Johanna Geron/File Photo
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EU Proposes New Copyright Rules for Generative AI

European Union flags fly outside the European Commission headquarters in Brussels, Belgium, March 1, 2023.REUTERS/Johanna Geron/File Photo
European Union flags fly outside the European Commission headquarters in Brussels, Belgium, March 1, 2023.REUTERS/Johanna Geron/File Photo

Companies deploying generative AI tools, such as ChatGPT, will have to disclose any copyrighted material used to develop their systems, according to an early EU agreement that could pave the way for the world's first comprehensive laws governing the technology.

The European Commission began drafting the AI Act nearly two years ago to regulate emerging artificial intelligence technology, which underwent a boom in investment and popularity following the release of OpenAI's AI-powered chatbot ChatGPT, Reuters said.

Members of the European Parliament agreed to push the draft through to the next stage, the trilogue, during which EU lawmakers and member states will thrash out the final details of the bill.

Under the proposals, AI tools will be classified according to their perceived risk level: from minimal through to limited, high, and unacceptable. Areas of concern could include biometric surveillance, spreading misinformation or discriminatory language.

While high-risk tools will not be banned, those using them will need to be highly transparent in their operations.

Companies deploying generative AI tools, such as ChatGPT or image generator Midjourney, will also have to disclose any copyrighted material used to develop their systems.

This provision was a late addition drawn up within the past two weeks, according to a source familiar with discussions. Some committee members initially proposed banning copyrighted material being used to train generative AI models altogether, the source said, but this was abandoned in favor of a transparency requirement.

"Against conservative wishes for more surveillance and leftist fantasies of over-regulation, parliament found a solid compromise that would regulate AI proportionately, protect citizens' rights, as well as foster innovation and boost the economy," said Svenja Hahn, a European Parliament deputy.

Macquarie analyst Fred Havemeyer said the EU's proposal was "tactful" rather than a "ban first, and ask questions later" approach proposed by some.

"The EU has been on the frontier of regulating AI technology," he told Reuters.

RACE TO MARKET

Microsoft-backed OpenAI provoked awe and anxiety around the world when it unveiled ChatGPT late last year. The chatbot became the fastest-growing consumer application in history, reaching 100 million monthly active users in a matter of weeks.

The ensuing race among tech companies to bring generative AI products to market concerned some onlookers, with Twitter-owner Elon Musk backing a proposal to halt development of such systems for six months.

Shortly after signing the letter, the Financial Times reported Musk was planning to launch his own startup to rival OpenAI.

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With Freebies, OpenAI, Google Vie for Indian Users and Training Data

FILE PHOTO: A message reading "AI artificial intelligence", a keyboard, and robot hands are seen in this illustration taken January 27, 2025. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration/File Photo
FILE PHOTO: A message reading "AI artificial intelligence", a keyboard, and robot hands are seen in this illustration taken January 27, 2025. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration/File Photo
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With Freebies, OpenAI, Google Vie for Indian Users and Training Data

FILE PHOTO: A message reading "AI artificial intelligence", a keyboard, and robot hands are seen in this illustration taken January 27, 2025. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration/File Photo
FILE PHOTO: A message reading "AI artificial intelligence", a keyboard, and robot hands are seen in this illustration taken January 27, 2025. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration/File Photo

OpenAI, Google and Perplexity have begun an unprecedented fight for artificial intelligence users in India, rolling out freebies in a strategy seen as a way to harvest troves of multilingual training data in the world's most populous nation.

India is the second-biggest smartphone market with 730 million devices. On average, Indians consume 21 gigabytes of data each month, paying 9.2 cents per gigabyte, one of the world's lowest mobile data rates. To lure price-conscious users, Google in November started giving its $400 Gemini AI Pro subscription for free for 18 months to 500 million customers of Reliance Jio, India's biggest telecom player.

Last week, it added India to dozens of countries where it is offering its heavily discounted "AI Plus" package. OpenAI has also made its ChatGPT Go plan, which offers extended but not unlimited usage compared with existing plans, free for a year.

The plan incurs charges in more than 100 countries and was $54 in India before being made free to everyone in the country in November, Reuters reported.

Just like Google's AI Pro, the free package is only available in India.

Early download data suggests a jump in usage due to the free plans, with daily active users of ChatGPT in India surging 607% year-on-year to 73 million as of last week - more than double the number in the US, according to data from market intelligence firm Sensor Tower compiled for Reuters.

Gemini's daily users in India rose 15% from when it launched the Reliance Jio offer in November to touch 17 million last week, compared to 3 million in the US, the data showed.

Perplexity, meanwhile, has made its Pro tool - priced at $200 a year globally - free for a year for users of Indian telecom company Airtel. It says the plan gives unlimited access to its most advanced research tools.

India now accounts for more than a third of Perplexity's global daily active users, up from just 7% last year, Sensor Tower data showed. OpenAI, Perplexity and Google did not respond to Reuters requests for comment.

TRAINING FILLS DATA GAPS
OpenAI's India executive, Pragya Misra, has said on social media the company's decision to make ChatGPT Go free was part of its "continued India-first commitment" and to make tools more accessible to everyone.

Five AI analysts, however, said the freebies strategy would help companies gain from India's linguistic diversity to secure crucial data for AI training.

They view the training data generated by Indian users, characterized by a mix of languages and dialects, as a critical stress test that will help AI models master complex communication patterns that are largely absent from the existing data. Free plans "fill gaps in AI training data sets that currently lack information on user behavior patterns in the region," said Sagar Vishnoi, co-founder at AI think tank Future Shift Labs.

FREEBIES WORK IN INDIA, OFTEN
Indian billionaire Mukesh Ambani's Reliance, which has partnered with Gemini, has repeatedly used aggressive pricing to boost its customer base. Its telecom unit now has more than 500 million users, after luring customers at its 2016 launch with months of free data and voice services.

Reliance and Disney offered cricket streaming for free on their India platforms, before merging their India media operations.

ChatGPT is seeing high app usage -- with 46% of its monthly users opening the app daily in India in November, compared to 20% for Perplexity and 14% for Gemini, Sensor Tower's data showed.

Anees Hassan, a PhD student in Hyderabad, is using the free ChatGPT and Gemini plans for three hours a day to find citations, refine his writing and generate images for presentations.

"The free plan was not good enough as I used to hit chat limit caps faster," said Hassan, 33.

Still, he is also aware that freebies sometimes come with costs.

"I am concerned about data harvesting, so I have used the opt-out feature to stop sharing my data for AI training," he added.

Technology

Alswaha: Saudi Arabia Leads International Indicators, Efforts to Bridge AI Gaps

Saudi Minister of Communications and Information Technology Abdullah Alswaha speaks at the event in New York. (SPA)
Saudi Minister of Communications and Information Technology Abdullah Alswaha speaks at the event in New York. (SPA)
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Alswaha: Saudi Arabia Leads International Indicators, Efforts to Bridge AI Gaps

Saudi Minister of Communications and Information Technology Abdullah Alswaha speaks at the event in New York. (SPA)
Saudi Minister of Communications and Information Technology Abdullah Alswaha speaks at the event in New York. (SPA)

Saudi Minister of Communications and Information Technology Abdullah Alswaha stressed on Tuesday that the Kingdom’s achievements represent the greatest digital success story of the 21st century.

This was possible by the support of Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud and the direct enablement by Prince Mohammed bin Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, Crown Prince and Prime Minister, reflecting their ambitious vision for building a comprehensive technological future.

The minister made his remarks from New York during his participation in the high-level meeting of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) on the overall review of the implementation of the outcomes of the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS).

Alswaha said that progress in the information society is reflected worldwide, with the number of internet users rising from around 800 million to nearly 6 billion.

The Kingdom ranked first globally on the ICT Development Index (IDI) issued by the UN International Telecommunication Union (ITU) and made remarkable progress in empowering women in the digital world, with female participation reaching approximately 36%, he revealed.

He highlighted that the foremost challenge today lies in bridging the gaps in artificial intelligence (AI), namely the computing gap, the data gap, and the algorithm gap.

Alswaha stated that the Kingdom leveraged its capabilities to boost advanced computing power and launch national language models that help close the data gap in the Arab world, including the AI model “ALLaM.”

Moreover, he noted global scientific achievements, such as Saudi scientist Omar Yaghi winning the 2025 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, reflecting Saudi Arabia’s scientific presence on the international stage.

He stressed that the achievements reflect the profound impact of the support from King Salman and Crown Prince Mohammed in consolidating the Kingdom’s global standing, enhancing its pivotal role in leading a more inclusive technological future, harnessing technologies for human benefit, supporting sustainable development, and aligning with the world’s aspirations for a more advanced and integrated era.

Technology

App Developers Urge EU Action on Apple Fee Practices 

An Apple logo adorns the façade of the downtown Brooklyn Apple store on March 14, 2020, in New York. (AP)
An Apple logo adorns the façade of the downtown Brooklyn Apple store on March 14, 2020, in New York. (AP)
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App Developers Urge EU Action on Apple Fee Practices 

An Apple logo adorns the façade of the downtown Brooklyn Apple store on March 14, 2020, in New York. (AP)
An Apple logo adorns the façade of the downtown Brooklyn Apple store on March 14, 2020, in New York. (AP)

A coalition of 20 app developers and consumer groups on Tuesday called upon European regulators to enforce EU laws against Apple, saying the company's fee structure unfairly disadvantages European developers compared to their US rivals after a recent court decision in the United States.

The European Union's Digital Markets Act (DMA), implemented in 2023, mandates that large tech platforms labelled "gatekeepers", such as Apple, facilitate in-app transactions outside their ecosystem at no charge.

The coalition's appeal reflects concerns over a disparity following a US court ruling that restricts Apple's ability to impose fees on external transactions.

The European Commission earlier this year fined Apple 500 million euros ($588 million) for breaching the DMA by obstructing developers from guiding users to alternative payment methods.

In response to the EU ruling, Apple revised its terms to impose fees ranging from 13% for smaller businesses to up to 20% for App Store purchases, alongside penalties of 5% to 15% on external transactions.

The Coalition for Apps Fairness (CAF), representing firms such as Deezer and Proton, argues these revised fees still violate DMA stipulations and says that US developers benefit from more favorable terms after the court decision.

"This situation is untenable and damaging to the app economy," CAF said in a statement, accusing Apple of undermining transparency and stifling innovation.

Global Policy Counsel for CAF, Gene Burrus, said that developers in the EU have to either bear the cost of those fees or pass them down to customers.

"It is bad for European companies, and it is bad for European consumers," he said.

According to CAF, European developers remain disadvantaged six months after the Commission declared Apple's policies illegal under the DMA.

Although Apple has announced further policy changes to take effect in January, it has yet to specify what these revisions will entail, fueling dissatisfaction among developers over the lack of clarity.

"We want the EU Commission to tell Apple that the law is the law and that free of charge means free of charge," Burrus said, adding that the European authorities should consider referring the issue to the European Court of Justice if necessary.