Jurisdiction(s):
European Union

EU Product Liability Directive brings AI software and models within strict liability: defectiveness presumptions, component liability, control and modification tests, disclosure duties, and value chain implications alongside the AI Act

Published on: 27 June 2024

Published by an LexisNexis EU Law expert

Legal News

Article summary

Drafting and deploying a fresh framework for overseeing artificial intelligence has largely consumed most of the regulatory energy EU technology legislators have wielded in recent years. Yet uncertainty persists over who bears responsibility when things go awry. The AI Liability Directive, intended to sit alongside the new EU AI Act, now confronts a precarious and highly uncertain outlook indeed. Meanwhile, as AI firms fixated on that file, a highly significant law for the sector slipped through with little public fanfare or attention: the Product Liability Directive. Though the updated statute lacks ‘AI’ in its title, it decisively broadens the EU’s rigorous product liability framework to fully encompass software. The EU Product Liability Directive has existed since the 1980s and has long served as a cornerstone of the bloc’s internal market architecture. As intangible goods such as software proliferated, the regime clearly required timely modernisation. AI, being a form of software, will fall entirely within the EU product liability system, although an economic actor’s accountability will hinge closely on its precise place in the value chain.

AI defectiveness

One of the clearer cases arises where an AI application causes direct harm because of a defect...

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