Meta will delay latest AI in EU over ‘unpredictable’ regulation

Meta on Thursday said it would delay the release of its most powerful generative AI models in Europe because of what it called unpredictable EU regulation.

The European Union has passed a raft of tech rules in recent years, posing an unprecedented list of do’s-and-don’t for the mostly US-based tech giants as they expand their services and offer new products.

In the generative AI race, Meta has designed Llama, AI models that are designed to offer the same capabilities as the technology behind OpenAI’s ChatGPT.

The next wave of these models are going to be multimodal, meaning that they can accept prompts and make content in text, video or audio. But Meta said that Europeans would be denied the innovations.

“We will release a multimodal Llama model over the coming months, but not in the EU due to the unpredictable nature of the European regulatory environment,” Meta said in a statement.

Meta said that the issue was over how to abide by the GDPR, the EU’s data privacy legislation that carefully dictates how companies handle the data of European users.

EU authorities are also preventing Meta from using public data to train its models, something it says its rivals Google and OpenAI, which is backed by Microsoft, have been able to do.

The company said that decision would be especially felt in upcoming updates to its Ray Ban smart glasses that would feature AI-amped abilities, such as translating signs or helping to engage in foreign languages in everyday settings.

Meta and other tech giants have increasingly delayed their latest offerings in Europe, citing the need to find legal clarity with EU authorities before they get released.

Last year, Meta delayed the release of its Twitter alternative Threads by several months in the EU.

Google has similarly held back the release of its own AI tools in the EU for several months.

The European Commission did not immediately respond to a request for comment, but has always stood by its commitment to implement its new arsenal of tech rules.

In a policy paper laying out her plans for her new five-year term, EU commission chief Ursula von der Leyen said the commission would “ramp up and intensify our enforcement” of tech regulation.

“Tech giants must assume responsibility for their enormous systemic power in our society and economy,” she said.

© 2024 AFP