Hungary joins the Blockchain Partnership, the Council of the EU sets priorities in AI and the EU institutions agree on the Copyright Directive in the trilogue.
Beyond the agreement on the Digital Europe programme (DEP), artificial intelligence (AI) and distributed ledger technologies (e.g. blockchain) featured high on the European agenda. The European Parliament (EP) approved in its plenary session on 12 February a report (see SwissCore article) requesting the mainstreaming of an EU industrial policy for AI. This report gives a clear political mandate for the next European Commission (EC) and the EP to consider AI a priority and focus on political initiatives to build a legislative framework for AI and robotics.
At the Competitiveness Council meeting on 18 February, the Council of the EU adopted its conclusions on the Coordinated Plan on Artificial Intelligence. The Council of the EU welcomes the publication of the action plan drafted by the EC responding to a mandate by the European Council. The Council of the EU highly welcomes several of the measures related to AI to be undertaken under DEP. In particular, the Council strongly emphasises the importance of allowing every company in Europe to seize digital opportunities and gain access to enabling technologies and the related skills. The access to test beds and experimentation and testing, foreseen to be facilitated by digital innovation hubs under DEP, is considered essential. With connected and autonomous mobility, healthcare and agriculture, three fields where the uptake of AI technologies is seen as exceptionally promising, are pointed out. In addition, the Council welcomes the synergies between the AI strategy and the Space programme and underlines the importance of the real-size reference sites for AI testing and experimentation supported with €1.5 billion under DEP. The Council stresses the need for more high-quality data, in particular trusted common European data spaces, which shall be supported with €1.0 billion under DEP. In the field of skills, the Council takes note of the shortage of ICT specialists, notably in AI. The Council emphasises the need to integrate digital skills at all levels of education and the set-up of high-quality programmes in tertiary education, as envisaged under the specific objective ‘Advanced Digital Skills’ of DEP. The Council furthermore supports the EC’s efforts to promote the European ethical approach to AI on a global level, and encourages international initiatives on AI such as the ones the OECD put in place.
The European Blockchain Partnership is growing and has welcomed Hungary as its 29th member. The members now include all EU Member States except Croatia and the EFTA members Norway and Liechtenstein. The partnership was created on 11 April 2018 in response to a request of the European Council in October 2017 to develop a European approach to blockchain. In February 2018, the EC launched the EU Blockchain Observatory and Forum, which will observe and map trends and existing initiatives and promote European actors. Blockchain is supported under Horizon 2020 already with roughly €300 million available for projects. The signatories of the European Blockchain Partnership agreed to establish a European Blockchain Services Infrastructure (EBSI) to support cross-border delivery of public services under highest standards of privacy and security. The implementation of EBSI shall be supported by the Connecting Europe Facility (CEF) as a new digital service infrastructure under the current multiannual financial framework (MFF). From 2021 onwards, DEP shall support a European ecosystem for trusted data sharing and infrastructure using distributed ledger services and applications, and will thus build on these first initiatives. A trusted framework should enable smaller companies to compete with larger players on an equal footing. The signatories invite all Members States, EFTA and EEA countries to join the partnership, meaning that besides Croatia also Iceland and potentially Switzerland could become members in the future.
Another delicate file in the digital domain is awaiting adoption. The trilogue on the copyright directive closed on 13 February and a compromise was reached, which now has to be confirmed in both, the Council of the EU and the EP. However, criticism and opposition remain strong. On text and data mining (TDM), a new article 3a, which allows Member States to provide TDM exceptions for organisations that are neither research organisations nor cultural heritage institutions. While DIGITALEUROPE, the largest association of digital industry in Europe welcomed the new provision, other R&I stakeholders are more critical. The secretary-general of the League of European Research Universities, Kurt Deketelaere, criticised in an interview that the second mining exception could potentially create an unbalanced patchwork of national rules. The indicative date for the vote in plenary is not yet set, the earliest date is presumably the week of 25-28 March.