AI stakeholder summit 2021

The first-ever legal framework on AI will be in the spotlight of the second edition of the AI stakeholder summit, co-organised by the Digital Transition and Single Market Observatory (EESC) and the Special Committee on Artificial Intelligence in a Digital Age (European Parliament).

The new legislation places health, safety and fundamental rights at its centre and resonates globally by setting a series of requirements developers, both in and outside Europe, will have to comply with if they want to sell their products in the EU.

What is necessary to boost the use of AI in EU businesses, especially SMEs? What are the safeguards for the deployment of AI systems in the workplace? Should we allow emotion or affect recognition, where a person's facial expressions, tone of voice, posture and gestures are analysed to predict future behaviour, detect lies and even to see if someone is likely to be successful in a job?

These questions will be at the heart of discussions with invited speakers from academia, private sector and civil society during the morning session organised and hosted by the EESC on 8th November 2021 from 9.30 to 12.30. In the afternoon, the summit continues in the European Parliament with a high-level political panel, followed by an interparliamentary meeting with national parliaments and a debate on the AI Act with rapporteurs from the EP and the EESC.