EU AI Act: How will the new regulation change the practical use of AI?

EU AI Act: How will the new regulation practically change the use of AI?

Imagine deploying an AI application that dramatically boosts your company's operations – only to receive a letter from the authorities and a fine exceeding your annual profit a few months later. This is not a distant scenario: the EU AI Act is already in force, and its penalties can reach up to 35 million euros. The good news is that, with proper preparation, the regulation is a competitive advantage – not a burden.

The European Union's AI Act establishes the world's first binding framework for how AI technology can be developed, deployed, and utilized. This is not merely a technical directive but a comprehensive regulation that directly impacts every company, public entity, and individual expert using digital tools within the EU. If you want to understand better how AI works in practice, also read our guide to AI prompts.

What is the core of the AI Act?

The fundamental idea of the regulation is risk-based: the greater the risk that an AI system poses to human safety, health, or fundamental rights, the stricter the regulation. Systems are divided into four main categories:

🚫 Prohibited systems

Social scoring, remote biometric identification in public places, behavioural manipulation. Prohibitions enter into force in February 2025.

⚠️ High-risk systems

Recruitment software, academic grading, critical infrastructure. Require strict conformity assessment.

👁️ Transparency-risk systems

Chatbots and image generators. Users must be made aware that they are interacting with a machine. Read more →

✅ Minimal-risk systems

Spam filters, intelligent functions in games. These are largely unaffected by additional regulation.

⏰ Important Timeline 2026: Rules for general-purpose AI models came into force in August 2025. Most obligations for high-risk systems will fully apply to operators by August 2, 2026. The last transitional periods conclude by 2027–2028. Also read: What new will AI bring in 2026?

Instructions for Action: What must different actors do?

1. 🏢 Entrepreneurs and Businesses

In the business world, AI applications are often the core of competitiveness, but carelessness can lead to fines of up to 35 million euros or 7 percent of global turnover. Also see how AI helps novice online merchants in practice.

  • Map the company's AI inventory: List every AI application used in the company. Identify whether they are used for mere content creation or for more critical operations, such as employee evaluations.

  • Identify your role: Are you a system provider (developer) or an implementing deployer (customer)? If you purchase third-party software and significantly modify it with your own data, you may legally become a provider, increasing your responsibilities.

  • Demand compliance reports from suppliers: When acquiring new software, request documentation from the service provider that their AI solution meets EU regulatory requirements.

  • Establish an internal AI policy: Create clear rules for employees on what information (e.g., customer data or trade secrets) can be entered into public systems.

2. 🏙️ Municipalities and the Public Sector

Municipalities and well-being services counties handle data that affects citizens' fundamental rights. Therefore, AI applications used in the public sector are very easily classified as high-risk.

  • Conduct a fundamental rights impact assessment: If a municipality uses algorithms, for example, for scoring social benefits distribution criteria or school choices, the impacts must be carefully assessed.

  • Ensure human oversight (Human-in-the-loop): No high-risk AI application should make final decisions entirely autonomously. The process must always involve a trained official who can override the machine's suggestion.

  • Update procurement criteria: In municipal IT procurements, conformity with the regulation's requirements must be a threshold issue. Systems must be required to have automatic logging and transparency.

  • Remember the registration obligation: The public sector must register the high-risk AI systems it uses in the EU's public database.

3. 👤 Individual AI users

Whether you are an employee, student, or hobbyist, the regulation brings rights and everyday obligations. For students, we also recommend our ultimate AI guide for students.

  • Maintain transparency in content creation: If you create images, videos, or news-like texts with generative AI that could mislead the public, you must clearly mark the content as AI-generated.

  • Recognise when you are interacting with a machine: You have the right to know if your chat partner is a robot or if a system is performing automatic profiling on you.

  • Develop your AI literacy: The regulation emphasizes citizens' ability to understand how an AI application produces its responses. Read more: AI Literacy 2026.

Compliant AI Applications: What to choose?

When an organization selects tools in the era of new regulation, it should look for solutions that offer built-in data security, transparency, and clear terms of use for data processing. Also compare: ChatGPT vs. Microsoft Copilot vs. Google Gemini.

Application Type Recommended Options Why compliant with regulation?
Language models and text generation Microsoft Copilot (Enterprise), ChatGPT Enterprise, Claude for Teams Submitted data is not used for retraining models. Intellectual property protection included.
European alternatives Mistral AI (France), Silo AI / Silo Gen (Finland) EU-based, GDPR compliant. Data storage remains within the EU.
Image generators Adobe Firefly Trained only with licensed data. Automatically adds Content Credentials.

Checklist: Master the EU AI Act

📋 Compliance Checklist – Review before August 2026:

  • ☐ Mapping: Have all AI applications used in the organization been identified and recorded?
  • ☐ Risk Classification: Has the risk level of each tool been assessed according to the regulation's criteria?
  • ☐ Usage Rules: Has a written AI policy been created for the organization?
  • ☐ Transparency: Are AI-generated public materials clearly marked?
  • ☐ Vendor Verification: Has a written compliance report been requested from IT partners?
  • ☐ Training: Has AI literacy training been provided for staff?
  • ☐ (High risk only) Human Oversight and Logging: Has a human overseer been appointed for the high-risk system?

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

Question: Does the EU AI Act prohibit the use of ChatGPT or other similar tools?
No, it does not. General-purpose AI applications like ChatGPT are fully permitted, but their developers are required to be transparent about training data. Business users should choose the Enterprise version. Read more: ChatGPT AI in everyday life, work, and studies 2026.

Question: Does the regulation apply to AI experiments by small businesses?
Yes, it does, if it is an AI application that meets the definition of the regulation. For minimal-risk tools (text correctors, basic analytics), the administrative burden is negligible. Responsibilities only increase if the company develops its own models or uses them in high-risk applications.

Question: Who supervises compliance with the AI Act in Finland?
Supervision is carried out by national supervisory authorities in cooperation with the EU AI Office. In Finland, supervisory duties are shared between the Office of the Data Protection Ombudsman and Traficom, depending on the application area.

Summary: Towards a Responsible AI Future

🚀 Remember this: The EU AI Act does not aim to halt technological development, but to guide it onto safe tracks. When the rules of the game are clear, trust in digital tools grows. Responsibility and proactive preparation will be the biggest success factors in the digital world going forward.

Want to learn more about the possibilities of AI?
Explore our AI blog or read how the best paid AI agents can boost your company's operations.

Keywords: artificial intelligence, AI applications, AI application, AI, EU AI Act, AI regulation, AI in business, AI in municipalities, AI checklist