GuidanceGuidancev1.0.0

Standard editing versus semantic change under the marking obligation

Spellchecking, formatting and minor image corrections fall outside the marking obligation. An AI summary, rewrite or face replacement falls inside it.

The official source remains authoritative. This is general information about obligations and not legal advice. See this object on the map

Address and citation

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Identifier: praxikon:eu:ai-act:guidance:guidance-article-50-standard-editing-exception
Payload hash (sha256): f1546b07eee9af5d0cecc75dfbe5f14aa1e16230be04bb1bc71fc1df8bfbd590

Citation line

Praxikon, "Standard editing versus semantic change under the marking obligation", praxikon:eu:ai-act:guidance:guidance-article-50-standard-editing-exception@1.0.0, dataset praxikon:sys:registry:dataset:ai-act-implementation-graph 2.1.0 (schema 1.4.0), effective_at 2026-08-08T00:00:00.000Z, known_at 2026-08-14T00:00:00.000Z, sha256 f1546b07eee9af5d0cecc75dfbe5f14aa1e16230be04bb1bc71fc1df8bfbd590

Version: 1.0.0
Legal time (effective_at): 8 August 2026
Knowledge time (known_at): 8 August 2026
Closed on: Not closed
Topics: guidance

Review status: Placed against the official source (8 August 2026). Next check due by 4 February 2027. The check date is the knowledge date of this version; no later recheck has been recorded.

What this object links to

Every relation appears below as a path: from the source with its locator, through the conditions and exceptions of the object carrying the relation, to the consequence. A locator belongs to a statement in the data and not to a relation, so the source is the source anchor of the carrying object.

The obligation this hangs off

1 of 1 shown

The object belongs to this obligation. The source line it hangs off sits there.

Source
Official fact on this object, with its locator.
- Guidelines on Article 50
  Locator: Commission Guidelines C(2026) 5054 final, Section 4.3, points (90) to (92) and the accompanying example lists
  praxikon:eu:ai-act:source:commission-article-50-guidelines
  Open official source
Via
- Condition | allApplies to providers of AI systems generating or manipulating synthetic audio, image, video or text content, in the context of the machine-readable marking and detection obligation of Article 50(2).
- ExceptionAlongside standard editing and non-substantial alteration, a third exception applies to generative systems authorised by law to generate or manipulate synthetic content to detect, prevent, investigate or prosecute criminal offences.
As long as this exception is not ruled out, the outcome stays conditional and you have to establish it yourself.
Consequence
- ObligationArticle 50: transparency
  praxikon:eu:ai-act:obligation:article-50-transparency

What this object is about

1 of 1 shown

The object is about this role. Undifferentiated: it does not follow that the duty rests on this role.

Source
Official fact on this object, with its locator.
- Guidelines on Article 50
  Locator: Commission Guidelines C(2026) 5054 final, Section 4.3, points (90) to (92) and the accompanying example lists
  praxikon:eu:ai-act:source:commission-article-50-guidelines
  Open official source
Via
- Condition | allApplies to providers of AI systems generating or manipulating synthetic audio, image, video or text content, in the context of the machine-readable marking and detection obligation of Article 50(2).
- ExceptionAlongside standard editing and non-substantial alteration, a third exception applies to generative systems authorised by law to generate or manipulate synthetic content to detect, prevent, investigate or prosecute criminal offences.
As long as this exception is not ruled out, the outcome stays conditional and you have to establish it yourself.
Consequence
- ActorProvider of an AI system
  praxikon:eu:ai-act:actor:provider

What this object states

Official fact

Attributable to a named primary source, with a locator. Where they differ, the official source prevails.

Point (90) of the guidelines of 20 July 2026 describes standard editing as the process of preparing existing content for publication or distribution, such as small edits to improve readability, grammar, quality and format, without generating new content. According to that same point, editing goes beyond standard editing where the content is changed in a material way through substantive or structural modifications that affect its meaning, style or intent. Point (91) addresses the second exception, for systems that do not substantially alter the input data provided by the deployer or the semantics thereof, and states that an alteration is substantial where the input data or its semantics have been manipulated significantly during output generation, to be assessed against factors including format, media content type, style and changes affecting meaning, style or intent. Point (92) provides that where a system can be used both for generation or manipulation and for minor non-substantial alterations, the obligation does not apply to the content altered in a minor non-substantial manner. As examples falling under the exception the document lists among others grammar correction and spellchecking, minor stylistic polishing that does not change substance or messaging, AI-generated translations, formatting and format conversion, noise reduction, minor cropping and colour corrections, removal of dust spots and red-eye, blurring of faces, rescaling of video clips and transcriptions of conversations. As examples of semantic changes that do require marking the document lists among others AI-generated summaries of text, paraphrasing or rewriting that changes style, structure and meaning, removal, replacement or insertion of objects or persons, face replacement, synthesis of realistic speech in a specific person's voice and the creation of composite images.
- Locator: Commission Guidelines C(2026) 5054 final, Section 4.3, points (90) to (92) and the accompanying example listspraxikon:eu:ai-act:source:commission-article-50-guidelinesOpen official source

Our interpretation

Our own reading. It can change without the law changing, and it is not the position of a supervisory authority.

The dividing line is meaning, not effort and not whether a human was involved. That produces two outcomes that surprise many organisations. The first: an AI-generated summary sits explicitly on the marking side. Summarising feels like editing, but the guidelines classify it as semantic change. Anyone auto-generating summaries of articles, reports or case files is therefore inside the marking obligation. The second, mirror-image: an AI-generated translation sits on the exempt side, as does transcription. That is the opposite of what many editorial teams assume. Finally, note point (92): the question is not what your tool can do, but what actually happened to the content in the specific case. The same tool can fall outside the obligation in one use and inside it in another.
- Locator: Commission Guidelines C(2026) 5054 final, Section 4.3, points (90) to (92) and the accompanying example listspraxikon:eu:ai-act:source:commission-article-50-guidelinesOpen official source

Recommended step

A practical step we consider appropriate. Not an obligation following from the Regulation.

Sort your AI applications into two buckets: editing without semantic change, and producing or changing meaning. Put summarising, rewriting, image editing where persons or objects disappear or appear, and voice cloning explicitly into the second bucket, and spellchecking, formatting, translation and transcription into the first. Record the classification per application with a short justification, because the guidelines require a case-by-case assessment rather than a per-tool one.
- Locator: Commission Guidelines C(2026) 5054 final, Section 4.3, points (90) to (92) and the accompanying example listspraxikon:eu:ai-act:source:commission-article-50-guidelinesOpen official source

When this applies

1Applies to providers of AI systems generating or manipulating synthetic audio, image, video or text content, in the context of the machine-readable marking and detection obligation of Article 50(2).

When this does not apply

Alongside standard editing and non-substantial alteration, a third exception applies to generative systems authorised by law to generate or manipulate synthetic content to detect, prevent, investigate or prosecute criminal offences.

Referring to this object

Citation block

Copy this reference into your advice, article or file. The identifier, the version and the hash keep the statement findable later, even once the dataset has moved on.

Reference

Praxikon, "Standard editing versus semantic change under the marking obligation",
praxikon:eu:ai-act:guidance:guidance-article-50-standard-editing-exception@1.0.0,
dataset praxikon:sys:registry:dataset:ai-act-implementation-graph 2.1.0 (schema 1.4.0),
effective_at 2026-08-08T00:00:00.000Z, known_at 2026-08-08T00:00:00.000Z,
sha256 f1546b07eee9af5d0cecc75dfbe5f14aa1e16230be04bb1bc71fc1df8bfbd590,
https://www.praxikon.com/en/verkenner/guidance/guidance-article-50-standard-editing-exception
(https://www.praxikon.com/api/v1/entities?id=praxikon%3Aeu%3Aai-act%3Aguidance%3Aguidance-article-50-standard-editing-exception&effective_at=2026-08-08&known_at=2026-08-08&lang=en, accessed 2026-08-25)

Short form

praxikon:eu:ai-act:guidance:guidance-article-50-standard-editing-exception@1.0.0 (sha256 f1546b07)

BibTeX

@misc{praxikon-eu-ai-act-guidance-guidance-article-50-standard-editing-exception-1-0-0,
  author       = {{Praxikon}},
  title        = {Standard editing versus semantic change under the marking obligation},
  year         = {2026},
  version      = {1.0.0},
  number       = {praxikon:eu:ai-act:guidance:guidance-article-50-standard-editing-exception},
  howpublished = {AI Act Change \& Evidence Graph, dataset 2.1.0, schema 1.4.0},
  note         = {effective_at 2026-08-08T00:00:00.000Z; known_at 2026-08-08T00:00:00.000Z; sha256 f1546b07eee9af5d0cecc75dfbe5f14aa1e16230be04bb1bc71fc1df8bfbd590},
  url          = {https://www.praxikon.com/en/verkenner/guidance/guidance-article-50-standard-editing-exception},
  urldate      = {2026-08-25},
  language     = {en}
}

CSL JSON

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