EU bans emotion-tracking AI to enhance protection against discrimination and manipulation
The European Union will ban emotion-tracking artificial intelligence under new guidelines effective August 2. This includes using webcams and voice recognition to monitor employees' emotions and AI technologies that manipulate users into spending money. The EU AI Act aims to protect individuals from discrimination and harassment by prohibiting practices like social scoring based on personal data and AI-enabled dark patterns. Companies face fines of 1.5% to 7% of global revenue for violations. The EU's approach is more comprehensive than that of the United States and differs from China's focus on state control. Concerns have been raised about the guidelines becoming outdated due to rapid AI development and recent political changes.