WhatsApp and artificial intelligence
AI transparency
AI transparency is the requirement that people know they are talking to an artificial intelligence system. Article 50 of Regulation (EU) 2024/1689 places it on the provider, who must design the system to tell them, unless it is obvious, from 2 August 2026.
Also known asAI disclosure · duty to inform · Article 50 of the AI Act · AI Act
What it is exactly
| Who | What falls to them |
|---|---|
| Provider: whoever develops the assistant and places it on the market under its own name (Article 3(3)) | Design it so that people know they are talking to an AI, unless that is obvious to someone reasonably well informed and attentive (Article 50(1)), in a clear and distinguishable way and at the latest at the first interaction (Article 50(5)). |
| Deployer: the residence that uses it under its own authority (Article 3(4)) | Take measures that support its staff's AI literacy (Article 4; since 27 July 2026 it does not require any particular level to be ensured). Disclosing that a text was generated by AI only falls to it if it publishes the text to inform the public on matters of public interest (Article 50(4)). |
Article 50 applies from 2 August 2026 (Article 113). It does not set a wording or require the notice to be repeated in every message: it asks that it arrives in time, is understood and meets accessibility requirements (Article 50(5)), with attention to people who are vulnerable because of age or disability (recital 132). Regulation (EU) 2026/1744, which amended the AI Act in July 2026, did not touch this notice, but it gave a provider whose system was already on the market before 2 August 2026 until 2 December 2026 to mark the content it generates (Articles 50(2) and 111(4)). An AI assistant that serves residents is not a high-risk system: student accommodation does not appear in Annex III. Alongside the notice, a clear route to a handoff to a human is advisable; in Bedel, escalation to people.
Worth knowing
What people take for granted: that it is enough for the bot to tell the truth when asked "are you a person?". Article 50 asks for people to be informed without having to ask, unless it is obvious. And a notice in a language the person cannot read is hardly "clear".
Sources
- Regulation (EU) 2024/1689 on artificial intelligence, Articles 3, 4, 50 and 113, recital 132 and Annex III (Official Journal, official copy on BOE, in Spanish)
- Regulation (EU) 2026/1744 (digital omnibus on AI), which rewrites Articles 4 and 50(7) and adds Article 111(4) (Official Journal, official copy on BOE, in Spanish)
Related terms
- AI assistantAn AI assistant is a program that holds a conversation in natural language and, with a language model behind it, understands what it is told even without keywords. In a residence it handles the messaging channel: it answers what is in the house rules, takes requests and passes the rest to a person.
- Handoff to a humanA handoff to a human is passing a conversation from the AI assistant to a member of staff, because the person asks for it or because the matter needs a decision. Done well, it reaches a specific phone with the context and, if nobody answers, moves up to the person in charge.