INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF TOURISM, TRAVEL AND HOSPITALITY LAW Among the key acts issued by the European Union is undoubtedly the so-called “AI act. (AIA)”; this is the Proposal Regulation laying down harmonized rules on artificial intelligence of April 21, 20212. The Proposal has the merit of providing several definitions, contained in Article 3, which is headed “Definitions”. The first definition is precisely that of “artificial intelligence”. The provision reads: «‘artificial intelligence’ (AI system) means software developed with one or more of the techniques and approaches listed in Annex I and can, for a given set of human-defined objectives, generate outputs such as content, predictions, recommendations, or decisions influencing the environments they interact with». This is a rather vague definition, referring to the specific lists in Annex I. The Artificial Intelligence Act (AIA) defines various areas of focus of AI systems: applications prohibited because they cause unbearable risks to fundamental rights and freedoms3; high-risk applications (not prohibited but subject to specific conditions to manage risks)4; limited-risk applications and other applications with negligible risk5. The list of banned AI systems includes online manipulative practices that produce physical or psychological harm to individuals or exploit their vulnerability based on age or disability; social scoring that produces disproportionate or decontextualized harmful effects; and biometric identification systems used by law enforcement in public spaces (when their use is not strictly necessary or when the risk of harmful effects is too high). For the first time, European regulators are attempting to define a boundary or limit that should not be crossed when employing AI-based services or products in society. Unlike prohibited AI systems, AI systems classified as “high risk” are not prohibited by default, but subject to several compliance obligations. These obligations include, among others, a risk management plan, compliance certification, a data management plan, and human oversight. The list of high- -risk AI systems in the AIA includes facial recognition; AI used in critical infrastructure; in educational, employment, or emergency contexts; in asylum 2 For an analysis of the proposed regulation see Finocchiaro, G. (2022) ‘La proposta di regolamento sull’intelligenza artificiale: il modello europeo basato sulla gestione del rischio’, Diritto dell’informazione e dell’informatica, 2022/2, pp. 303-327; Towsend, B. (2021) ‘Decoding the Proposed European Union Artificial Intelligence Act’, Insights, 25(20); Veale, M., Borgesius, F.Z. (2021) Demystifying the Draft EU Artificial Intelligence Act, in Computer Law Review International, 4/2021, pp. 97-112. 3 Such indications can be found in art. 5 of the AIA. 4 These kinds of systems are indicated analytically in the annex III of the Proposal. 5 Some information is provided in the explanatory memorandum of the AIA.
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