Cdm, Nordio: ‘Imprisonment from 1 to 5 years for those who create damage with artificial intelligence’

There is a crackdown on the distorted uses of artificial intelligence: “Whoever disseminates videos or images altered with AI without consent, causing unjust damage, is punished with imprisonment from 1 to 5 years”, explained the Minister of Justice Carlo Nordio in the press conference at the end of the Council of Ministers which approved the new rules. “The criminal aspect – he explained – can be devastating because it can create a reality that is no longer virtual but real, it can give a realistic representation of a person, not cartoonish or photomontage-like. A real world can be created even if it is virtual. So this is why the criminal law comes into play.” In addition to justice, the bill passed declines the European AI Act regulation: it regulates copyright, the entry of AI into healthcare, defines who develops the strategy (Palazzo Chigi), establishes who monitors and supervises (the Agency for ‘Digital Italy and the National Cybersecurity Agency becoming National Authorities for Artificial Intelligence). And to attract experts, it extends tax breaks for repatriates to those who have worked on artificial intelligence abroad.

The new crime

Specifically, the rule illustrated by Nordio provides that “anyone who causes unjust harm to a person by sending, transferring, publishing or disseminating without his consent images, videos or voices altered or falsified through the use of artificial intelligence systems and capable of inducing deception as to their genuineness, is punished with imprisonment from one to five years”.

Crimes for which the use of AI will constitute an aggravating circumstance

The Keeper of the Seals then specified that “when the use of AI is carried out in an insidious way, it constitutes a specific aggravating factor for a whole series of crimes, such as impersonation, fraudulent raising and lowering of prices, fraud, computer fraud, money laundering, market manipulation”. For these crimes, he added, the use of AI therefore constitutes “an aggravating circumstance, because it is a damned insidious and unfortunately effective means”. Nordio said he was aware of the difficulties that will be encountered in the future: “No one is under the illusion that the criminal law constitutes an absolute deterrent, but it fills a protection gap”.

Tax breaks for AI researchers who return to Italy

The law on AI approved today at Palazzo Chigi, among other things, extends the tax relief regime for impatriates also to those who have carried out research abroad in the field of artificial intelligence technologies. The law, explained the undersecretary for technological innovation Alessio Butti, is aimed at those returning from the United States but also from other European countries.

Urso: “One billion euros to facilitate start-ups”

As announced by Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni already last month, Italy aims to develop AI with one billion euros thanks to the commitment of CDP, and in particular CDP Venture Capital. The Minister of Business and Made in Italy Adolfo Urso explained that “the issue of the impact of AI in the business world is also addressed, especially taking into account that we have over 4 million SMEs that must be put in a position to fully use these technologies”. The provision, said Urso, “directs one billion euros from the innovation fund to venture capital managed by CDP on the one hand to facilitate the creation of start-ups and to grow existing start-ups operating in AI, and on the other to allow the creation of a national champion like other EU countries do.”