What do new European Union (EU) AI transparency rules mean for your content?

On 2 August 2026, the EU introduced new rules around AI transparency that every communicator needs to understand. Here’s the European Commission’s news piece on it with a useful explainer video. It means that companies operating in the bloc will need to clearly disclose where and how AI has been used in AI-generated or manipulated content, such as audio, video, and images. Text-based content appears to be treated slightly differently, as it concerns matters of public interest and contains conditions around human editorial overview. The rules also cover chatbots.

The EU has made some icons available for brands to include in their content. The rules apply to any brands whose content serves EU audiences, and the fines are substantial: up to €15 million or three percent of global turnover.

These moves have come in response to growing concerns around deepfake and AI-manipulated content, and to ensure transparency so that citizens can discern the difference between human-made content and AI-generated.

What does this mean for brands?

Please note this does not constitute ‘legal advice’, as I am not a lawyer, so I recommend brands consult their own legal teams for guidance. But it appears that if you use AI to generate images, video, or audio, you should disclose it. With text-based content, meaningful human intervention and overview appear to be critical, so check with your legal teams on how to proceed.

If you create your own content but only use AI to assist with improving it, then that appears to be different. In our About Us page, we are transparent about how we use AI. I draft from scratch and use Claude for ideation and critiquing (never mentioning the client’s name), and Grammarly for grammar and typo checks. While this may not constitute ‘AI-generated’ content and is fairly standard practice for copywriters, it may be best practice in the current environment to play it safe and include a disclosure note at the end of your posts.

I expect brands will move away from creating AI-generated content and revert to human-first generation. If you’d like to discuss your B2B copywriting requirements, please get in touch. 

Disclosure: Human-written text critiqued using Claude and grammar/spell-checked using Grammarly.