What Is the EU AI Act and How It Affects Browsers

The EU AI Act is the European Union's law on artificial intelligence. It sorts AI systems by risk and sets rules for each level. It doesn't regulate browsers directly, but it covers many of the AI features now built into them, and the AI tools people use through them.

The timeline

• 1 August 2024: the Act entered into force.
• 2 February 2025: bans on unacceptable-risk uses began, along with AI literacy duties for organizations.
• 2 August 2025: rules for general-purpose AI models, the large models behind chatbots, began.
• 2 August 2026: most remaining rules apply, including the transparency duties below.
• 2 August 2027: rules for high-risk AI built into regulated products.

In November 2025, the European Commission proposed delaying some high-risk rules, so check the current status if those matter to you.

The risk levels

• Banned: for example, manipulative techniques that cause harm, social scoring, and emotion recognition in workplaces and schools.
• High risk: uses such as hiring, credit, education and essential services face strict requirements.
• Transparency rules: chatbots and AI-generated content.
• Minimal risk: most other AI, such as spam filters, with no new duties.

What changes for AI in browsers

• Telling you it's AI: from August 2026, AI systems that talk with people must make clear you're dealing with AI, unless it's obvious.
• Marking AI content: providers of systems that generate images, audio, video or text must mark the output in a machine-readable way, so it can be detected as AI-made.
• Labeling deepfakes: people who publish realistic AI-generated or altered media must disclose it.
• The models underneath: companies providing general-purpose models must publish a summary of their training content and have a policy for respecting copyright, including opt-outs sites make in machine-readable form.

In July 2025, the Commission published a voluntary code of practice for general-purpose model providers. Most large AI companies signed it; Meta declined.

Penalties

Fines for using banned practices can reach €35 million or 7% of a company's worldwide annual turnover, whichever is higher.

What it means for you

• Expect clearer labels on AI chat features and AI-generated media.
• Site owners can signal they don't want content used for AI training. See blocking AI crawlers.
• If you'd rather not see AI answers in search, Search Cleaner hides Google's AI Overviews and the AI Mode tab.

This is a summary, not legal advice. See how AI Overviews get answers wrong.