Our chatbot talks to customers. Does it have to say it is AI?

retail and consumer

Code assistant for developers: an exception, until it faces outward

A software company uses an AI assistant for code suggestions and code review, available only to professional developers. The same company also runs a helpdesk chatbot for customers.

Provenance: The Commission guidelines of 20 July 2026 list code assistance and code review chatbots available only to professional developers as an example where the obviousness exception applies. Chatbots embedded in online platforms or helpdesks, where users may perceive outputs as human-generated, they list as an example where the disclosure duty does apply.

Two AI assistants at the same company, two outcomes. Assess per application who the user is and what they reasonably expect, rather than taking one organisation-wide position on chatbots.

Commission Guidelines C(2026) 5054 final, 20.7.2026, paragraph (45), lists with and without the obviousness exception

retail and consumer

Fraud reporting portal at a bank: why the law enforcement exception drops out

A bank opens an AI-driven reporting portal where customers can flag suspected fraud around their payment account or loan. The system asks follow-up questions, categorises the report and routes it to fraud detection and, where money laundering signals appear, to the internal reporting team. Because the portal concerns criminal offences, the bank assumes the disclosure duty for direct AI interaction does not apply.

Provenance: The Commission guidelines of 20 July 2026 expressly list AI-assisted fraud reporting hotlines and digital portals operated by financial institutions or public authorities, where users can report suspected financial crimes, as an example that is not exempted and falls within the scope of Article 50(1). They explain that the exception does not apply where the system is available to the public and offers individuals the functionality to report a criminal offence. The fact that the system only gathers details, categorises and prioritises the report while human investigators validate the information before any action is taken does not change that in the guidelines.

In our reading this is where banks most often take the wrong turn: the reporting portal sits organisationally under fraud and compliance, which makes the law enforcement exception feel natural, while it is precisely the public reporting channel that is carved out of that exception. On top of that, the exception is written for use authorised by law for law enforcement purposes, and the guidelines stretch it no further than to other public authorities holding such a legal basis, so in our reading a private bank rarely stands in it at all, before the public reporting channel even comes up. Treat the portal as an ordinary public-facing chat and put the disclosure in the first screen of the conversation. A line in the terms and conditions or a product leaflet is a weak choice for this channel, because by then the person is already telling their story.

Commission Guidelines C(2026) 5054 final, 20.7.2026, points (48) and (49), list of examples under the law enforcement exception

retail and consumer

A webshop helpdesk chatbot must announce itself

A webshop runs an AI chatbot for questions about orders, delivery and returns. The bot writes fluent prose, carries a staff profile picture, and nowhere does it say that no human is reading along.

Provenance: The final Commission guidelines on Article 50 treat this case as a worked example under the transparency obligations. The document is non-binding.

Do not count on the obviousness exception, because the more human your customer-facing bot looks, the more you must disclose its artificial nature at the first turn rather than only in the terms.

Commission Guidelines C(2026) 5054 final, 20.7.2026, worked examples under Article 50

retail and consumer

An induction call with the customer at the moment of go-live

Asimov AI is a micro organisation of at most fifteen people that supplies AI services for legislative work to government institutions and companies. With every new contract it holds one or more induction calls with the team leads and officials who will use the platform, explaining how the platform and the underlying models work and how hallucinations arise in this domain and can be mitigated.

Provenance: This practice was submitted by the organisation itself to the Commission living repository. The repository collects and shares practices; it does not approve them or set them as a standard.

This practice puts literacy where the risk arises: with the people who will operate the system, at the moment they start. For a small provider that is also the only workable moment, because there is no training department to redo it later. Anyone adopting it should record who attended and what was explained, because otherwise the effort survives only in the participants memory a year on.

Levend repository van AI-geletterdheidspraktijken, ingediende praktijk van de betrokken organisatie

AI agents must disclose both their AI nature and on whose behalf they act

Point (31) of the guidelines of 20 July 2026 states that AI agents are covered by Article 50(1) if they are capable of interacting with the persons instructing them or with other natural persons in the execution of their tasks, citing as examples making bookings, managing correspondence, negotiating or concluding contracts and executing purchases. That same point requires AI agents to be designed and developed so that they disclose both their artificial nature and the person on whose behalf they are acting, given the need for transparency of the origin and of the delegation of authority and accountability for the consequences of their actions. This also applies in complex multi-agent architectures in which other agents interact directly with natural persons. Where the provider cannot reliably determine before placing on the market or putting into service whether the agent will directly interact with a natural person, the agent should be designed at the architecture level and instructed to disclose itself in every situation where it is reasonably likely to interact with a natural person, including where that person represents a legal entity. Agents should also disclose themselves to the persons instructing them at key steps such as authorisation, reporting and validation, including where the agent receives, processes or relies upon outputs generated by other AI systems rather than by a natural person, and at every new interaction. Point (63) adds that Article 50(2) may apply to AI agents where the agent takes an action whose output is AI-generated or manipulated content perceptible by natural persons, while intermediate processing steps such as reasoning and chain of thought and non-perceptible actions such as a web request or browser action fall outside that scope.

Commission Guidelines C(2026) 5054 final, Section 3.1.1 point (31) and Section 4.1.2 point (63)

Artistic or satirical work is not exempt but attenuated, and the informative character always prevails

Point (119) of the guidelines of 20 July 2026 describes an attenuated transparency obligation for deep fakes forming part of evidently artistic, creative, satirical, fictional or analogous works or programmes, where the obligation is limited to disclosure in an appropriate manner that does not hamper the display or enjoyment of the work. Point (120) describes the categories: artistic works are created for the purpose of art, including music, cinematographic works and visual arts; creative works involve creative choices, while works mainly motivated by functional or technical considerations cannot be regarded as creative; satirical works are intended to criticise society, politics, business or public figures through humoristic techniques; fictional works involve persons, objects, places, entities or events in an imaginary but verisimilitude setting; analogous works share core traits with those categories without fitting neatly into one. Point (122) states that it must be evident to the natural persons exposed to it that the content falls within one of those categories, that the categories must therefore be interpreted strictly given the lighter disclosure regime and the interests of freedom of expression and freedom of the arts and sciences, and that content whose nature is potentially unclear or ambiguous to the audience falls outside this lighter regime. Relevant factors, per that same point, are whether the content displays formats or styles characteristic of the category, the context in which it is presented, and audience expectations. That same point excludes content whose nature is exclusively informative or commercial and recognisable as such, citing news reporting, notes that advertisements or documentaries may be regarded as evidently creative or fictional in certain specific situations but not in others because the assessment is case-specific, and states that where the deep fake combines multiple characters, for example informative and creative, the informative character should always prevail and the standard labelling requirements apply. Point (123) stresses that these deep fakes are not excluded from the obligation: the deployer must still disclose the AI origin or manipulation, but may do so in an appropriate manner, and must in any case comply with Article 50(5). Point (124) states that reliance on the attenuated obligation cannot justify failing to respect the fundamental rights of individuals or the rights of rightsholders under Union intellectual property or data protection law. As examples within the categories the document cites movies featuring AI de-aged existing actors or digital replicas of deceased actors, AI-generated music in the style of existing artists, and an AI-manipulated image of an existing politician in a scene clearly meant as humorous criticism. Outside the categories the document places among others an AI-manipulated video in the style of a teleshopping channel, AI-generated images of celebrities implying involvement in activities that never happened, and an AI-manipulated video featuring a realistic synthetic influencer focused solely on displaying a sponsored product's functionalities.

Commission Guidelines C(2026) 5054 final, Section 6.1.3, points (119) to (124) and the accompanying example lists

Signing the code of practice is voluntary, but not signing means proving it yourself

The Commission Q&A on signing the Code of Practice on Transparency of AI-generated Content states that signing is voluntary and that not signing does not constitute non-compliance with the AI Act. That same Q&A states that the code has two sections, one for providers on marking AI-generated or manipulated content in machine-readable formats and the related detection mechanisms, and one for deployers on the disclosure and labelling of deep fakes and of certain AI-generated or manipulated text on matters of public interest. It further states that signatories may, subject to a positive assessment by the Commission and the AI Board, rely on the code to demonstrate compliance with their obligations under Article 50 regardless of their place of establishment, and that the deadline for inclusion in the initial list of signatories was 27 July 2026 at 18:00 CEST, with later signature remaining possible but not appearing on that initial list. The Commission guidelines of 20 July 2026 state in point (146) that providers and deployers within the scope of Article 50(2) and (4) may demonstrate compliance by adhering to a code of practice assessed as adequate under Article 50(7), and that such a code does not replace the Regulation or the guidelines but complements them as the only Union-wide recognised practical framework for that purpose. Point (147) states that compliance may also be demonstrated through other adequate means, that for signatories supervisory activities will focus on whether they have adhered to the code and implemented the measures it contains, and that opting out of sections results in losing the benefit of facilitated demonstration of compliance for that part. Point (148) states that non-signatories are expected to demonstrate through other adequate means how they comply with Article 50(2), (4) and (5) and to explain how their measures ensure compliance, for instance by carrying out a gap analysis comparing their measures with those set out in a code assessed as adequate, and that they will likely face more requests for information and for access. Point (149) states that competent authorities may take commitments implemented in line with a code assessed as adequate into account as a mitigating factor when setting the amount of fines. Point (150) states that if a code is not deemed adequate, the Commission may adopt an implementing act specifying common rules for the implementation of Article 50(2), (4) and (5).

Commission Guidelines C(2026) 5054 final, Section 8.1, points (146) to (150); Commission Q&A on signing the Code of Practice on Transparency of AI-generated Content (consulted 9 August 2026)

The deployer cannot rely on the provider's machine-readable marking

Point (117) of the guidelines of 20 July 2026 states that deployers of AI systems generating or manipulating deep fake content must clearly and distinguishably disclose that the content has been artificially created or manipulated, by labelling the output accordingly and disclosing its artificial origin. According to that same point, the labelling or disclosure methods used must be understandable and perceivable by natural persons, for example with visible or audible labels, without those persons needing to rely on any specific technical tools or performing dedicated actions. The point closes expressly by stating that deployers cannot rely on the machine-readable marking embedded in the content by the provider under Article 50(2), since those markings are not immediately clear and distinguishable for the natural persons exposed to the deep fake content. Point (12) adds that deployers involved in complex content production and distribution value chains must take proportionate measures to ensure that the labelling they have implemented under Article 50(4) is actually displayed in a clear and distinguishable manner to the targeted and foreseeable audience at the point of first exposure, for example via contractual conditions with distributing partners and via user experience settings and interfaces. Point (14) states that a legal person remains the deployer even where it involves third parties such as contractors or freelancers in the operation of the system on its behalf and under its authority, and that individual employees acting under its instructions and control are not considered separate deployers.

Commission Guidelines C(2026) 5054 final, 20.7.2026, Section 6.1.2 point (117) and Section 2.3 points (12) and (14)