As a long-standing technology partner to European governments, businesses, and citizens, Microsoft seeks to ensure that the continent benefits from digital technologies and artificial intelligence (AI), while continuing to respect the rights of EU citizens online.
AI is no longer a distant prospect but a present reality, reshaping the business landscape, revolutionizing healthcare, and accelerating scientific discovery across the EU. Yet, as with any transformative technology, AI brings potentially significant challenges as well as immense opportunities. As a technology company providing AI services, we bear a responsibility to make sure that the solutions we deliver are deserving of public trust.
The start of the new EU mandate offers an opportunity to reflect on how best to leverage new technologies for the benefit of people across the continent — driving innovation and competitiveness —as well as to take proportionate steps to protect people from potential abuses of the same technology. At Microsoft, we are looking forward to working with the new decision makers in the European institutions as they embark on the 2024-2029 mandate.
Strong political leadership is all the more necessary as we stand at the beginning of a new age of technological innovation. As President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, said, “Europe is leading the way in making AI safer and more trustworthy, and oin tackling the risks stemming from its misuse.”. In this pursuit, however, the EU should not lose sight of AI’s central role in driving the continent’s digital transformation and potential for economic growth. Indeed, the EU should therefore “focus on becoming a global leader in AI innovation,” as emphasized by President von der Leyen in her political guidelines. In her commitment to protecting democracy, President von der Leyen also expressed her intention to continue strengthening the EU’s approach to AI-produced content in the current mandate.
Advancing innovation and safety will require a balanced, whole-of-society approach that recognizes the respective roles of government, civil society, and industry. The EU is already at the forefront of creating robust legal and regulatory frameworks, making industry players accountable for the development of safe online products, including AI. Microsoft recognizes the legislative developments undertaken during the 2019-2024 mandate of the Commission and stands ready to engage in dialogue with EU stakeholders on implementing these in an effective and proportionate way. We also see a need for modernized criminal and other laws to help address the misuse of AI. The pace of innovation calls for a continued focus on these challenges as the AI revolution unfolds.
Our annual safety research reveals the scale of the potential challenge. Certain societal groups are disproportionately at risk from deliberate misuse of this technology. We therefore see a need for practical steps to protect people — most notably children, women, and older adults — from the harms that arise from abusive AI-generated content.
In this white paper, we outline steps that Microsoft is taking to address this harm, as well as policy recommendations to build on the existing efforts and rules that address these issues head-on.
Central to our recommendations is the need to establish clear and proportionate rules that protect individuals while enabling Europe to continue innovating. In our paper, we advocate for the EU to integrate provenance tools, strengthen appropriate existing legal frameworks, and enhance measures that put victim-based decision making at the forefront.
As a company, we know we need a strong safety architecture for our services, grounded in safety by design, and incorporating durable media provenance and watermarking. Equally, we must continue to safeguard our services from abusive content and conduct (whether synthetic or not), through robust collaboration across industry and with governments and civil society, supported by ongoing education and public awareness efforts. It is crucial that we build trust in AI across society for its benefits to be fully realized.
In the context of the EU’s mature regulatory landscape, we center our recommendations on enhancing the response to the misuse of AI, through the lens of three key risk areas:
1. Protecting children from online exploitation.
2. Safeguarding women from non-consensual intimate imagery.
3. Safeguarding older adults, especially against AI-enabled fraud.
The challenges we face are significant, but so is the opportunity. By proactively addressing these issues, we can build a future where AI enhances human creativity, protects individual privacy, and strengthens the foundations of our democracy.
At Microsoft, we are committed to playing our part, but we recognize that we cannot do it alone. We welcome engagement and feedback from stakeholders across the EU’s digital ecosystem. It is essential that we get this right, and that means working together.
Microsoft stands for technology that is a positive force in society and people’s lives, in line with our mission to empower every person and organization on the planet to achieve more. The time for action is now.
Read our full report here: aka.ms/SyntheticMediaEUWhitepaper