{"id":447982,"date":"2026-03-18T17:20:39","date_gmt":"2026-03-18T16:20:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/2026\/03\/18\/le-app-che-spogliano-le-persone-nel-mirino-dellue-il-parlamento-chiede-il-divieto\/"},"modified":"2026-03-18T17:51:24","modified_gmt":"2026-03-18T16:51:24","slug":"eu-apps-that-strip-people-are-under-scrutiny-parliament-calls-for-a-ban","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/2026\/03\/18\/eu-apps-that-strip-people-are-under-scrutiny-parliament-calls-for-a-ban\/","title":{"rendered":"EU, apps that &#8220;strip&#8221; people are under scrutiny: Parliament calls for a ban"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Brussels \u2013 The European Union must ban the sale of so-called &#8220;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.cnbc.com\/2026\/01\/27\/apple-google-host-dozens-of-ai-nudify-apps-like-grok-report-finds.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">nudifier apps<\/a>&#8220;, artificial intelligence systems capable of altering images of real people to create, without their consent, <strong>nude or sexually explicit versions<\/strong>. This is the substance of a joint <strong>amendment<\/strong> to the <a href=\"https:\/\/digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu\/en\/policies\/regulatory-framework-ai\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Artificial Intelligence Act (AIA)<\/a>, which the European Parliament\u2019s committees on the <strong>Internal Market<\/strong> and <strong>Consumer Protection<\/strong> and on <strong>Civil Liberties<\/strong> and <strong>Justice<a href=\"https:\/\/www.europarl.europa.eu\/news\/en\/press-room\/20260316IPR38219\/meps-support-postponement-of-certain-rules-on-artificial-intelligence\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"> adopted<\/a><\/strong> today (18 March) with 101 votes in favour, 9 against, and 8 abstentions. The AI Act, which comes into force in 2024, is the EU regulation on the use of artificial intelligence, and the European Commission<strong> <\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.gleisslutz.com\/en\/know-how\/commissions-digital-omnibus-proposal-simplify-artificial-intelligence-act\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><strong>initiated the amendment process<\/strong><\/a> in November 2025.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>The European Parliament had announced its intention to push for a ban on &#8220;nudifier&#8221; apps as early as mid-January, when <strong>GROK<\/strong>,&nbsp;the AI assistant of the social network X, found itself at the centre of a<a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/news\/ng-interactive\/2026\/jan\/11\/how-grok-nudification-tool-went-viral-x-elon-musk\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"> controversy<\/a> concerning the mass generation of content that &#8220;undressed&#8221;\u2014virtually and without their knowledge\u2014real people. According to <a href=\"https:\/\/counterhate.com\/research\/grok-floods-x-with-sexualized-images\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">data<\/a>&nbsp;released by the NGO <strong>Centre&nbsp;for Countering Digital Hate<\/strong>, GROK is said to have produced <strong>3 million sexually explicit images<\/strong> and <strong>20,000 artificial reproductions of child sexual abuse<\/strong> over an eleven-day period between late 2025 and early 2026, before the platform controlled by Elon Musk announced measures to combat their spread. But it is not just about Grok, as <strong>Michael McNamara<\/strong>, co-rapporteur for the Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs, stated: \u201cThe proposal was eagerly awaited by our citizens.\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>In addition to the ban on &#8220;nudifying&#8221; AI systems, the two committees also approved further amendments to the AI Act. In particular, MEPs decided to <strong>postpone<\/strong> the entry into force of certain <strong>rules on so-called &#8220;high-risk&#8221; AI systems<\/strong>, such as those that use biometrics or are deployed in critical sectors such as infrastructure and healthcare. Current legislation requires companies to comply with the new rules <strong>by 2 August this year<\/strong>, but according to EU lawmakers, \u201cthe definition of key standards is unlikely to be ready by this date.\u201d For this reason, <strong>two new deadlines<\/strong> are being proposed: <strong>2 December 2027<\/strong> for high-risk AI systems listed directly in the law, and <strong>2 August 2028<\/strong> for those already subject to other EU regulations on safety and market surveillance. The committees also welcomed the extension of the timeframe for companies to comply with the rules on so-called watermarking, i.e.,&nbsp;indicators showing when content has been generated using artificial intelligence. In this case, however, MEPs suggest <strong>a shorter extension until 20 November 2026<\/strong>, rather than the European Commission&#8217;s proposed deadline of 2 February 2027.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;The latest set of amendments approved today proposes a series of measures to make the rules on AI &#8220;<strong>simpler and more flexible<\/strong>&#8221; for businesses, ensuring they do not become an obstacle to innovation. These include the <strong>extension of support measures<\/strong> for the use of artificial intelligence, already provided for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), to so-called <strong>Small Mid-Cap Enterprises<\/strong>, companies of a size intermediate between SMEs and large groups, and the <strong>relaxation of the obligations<\/strong> under the AI Act for <strong>products already regulated<\/strong> by sector-specific European laws (such as medical devices, radio equipment, and toys). Another point concerns potential <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ibm.com\/think\/topics\/ai-bias\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">biases<\/a> in artificial intelligence systems. Companies will be able, in limited cases and with appropriate safeguards, to<strong> use personal data to identify and correct these biases<\/strong>. The aim is to make systems fairer: for example, to prevent an algorithm used to select job candidates from favouring men over women simply because it was trained on unbalanced data.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>The plenary session in Strasbourg will vote on the amendments approved today on <strong>26 March<\/strong>, the date from which negotiations with Member States within the Council of the EU may begin.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>As part of the review of the AI Act, the Internal Market and Civil Liberties Committees have opposed the sale of &#8220;nudifier&#8221; apps. Amendments have also been approved to make AI regulations &#8220;simpler and more flexible&#8221; for businesses<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7899,"featured_media":328854,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"episode_type":"","audio_file":"","podmotor_file_id":"","podmotor_episode_id":"","cover_image":"","cover_image_id":"","duration":"","filesize":"","filesize_raw":"","date_recorded":"","explicit":"","block":"","jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":{"format":"standard","override":[{"template":"1","parallax":"1","fullscreen":"1","layout":"right-sidebar","sidebar":"default-sidebar","second_sidebar":"default-sidebar","sticky_sidebar":"1","share_position":"top","share_float_style":"share-monocrhome","show_featured":"1","show_post_meta":"1","show_post_author":"1","show_post_author_image":"1","show_post_date":"1","post_date_format":"default","post_date_format_custom":"Y\/m\/d","show_post_category":"1","show_post_reading_time":"0","post_reading_time_wpm":"300","post_calculate_word_method":"str_word_count","show_zoom_button":"0","zoom_button_out_step":"2","zoom_button_in_step":"3","show_post_tag":"1","show_prev_next_post":"1","show_popup_post":"1","show_comment_section":"1","number_popup_post":"1","show_author_box":"0","show_post_related":"1","show_inline_post_related":"0"}],"image_override":[{"single_post_thumbnail_size":"crop-500","single_post_gallery_size":"crop-500"}],"trending_post_position":"meta","trending_post_label":"Trending","sponsored_post_label":"Sponsored by","disable_ad":"0","subtitle":""},"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_override_counter":{"view_counter_number":"0","share_counter_number":"0","like_counter_number":"0","dislike_counter_number":"0"},"footnotes":""},"categories":[25712,25710],"tags":[29100,25821,26088,25755,32833,28885,33440,33441],"class_list":["post-447982","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-general-news","category-net-tech-en","tag-ai-act-en","tag-artificial-intelligence-en","tag-elon-musk-en","tag-news-parliament-en","tag-grok","tag-ia-and","tag-michael-mcnamara","tag-nudifiers"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/447982","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7899"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=447982"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/447982\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":447983,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/447982\/revisions\/447983"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/328854"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=447982"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=447982"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=447982"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}