MOSCOW, July 21 (HS/RIA Novosti) - The European Union has to escalate the development of its own AI models, otherwise the union risks ending up being dependent on the decisions of third parties, particularly the United States, in the sphere of vital technologies, which could be used as a tool for geopolitical pressure, European Commission Executive Vice-President for Tech Sovereignty, Security and Democracy Henna Virkkunen said.

It’s so important also that Europe is building up our own capacities and that we are not dependent on third countries for these very critical technologies, Virkkunen told the Financial Times in an interview out on Tuesday.

Governments with the power to cut off other countries from accessing AI models could use that in their own interests, she said.

Virkkunen said that recent restrictions imposed by the US on the export of the Anthropic company's AI models, have shown that access to such technologies can be used as a geopolitical tool. Therefore, the European Commission is holding negotiations with Washington to preserve access to the most powerful AI models, while also planning to increase investments in European developments in this area.

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Hindusthan Samachar / Indrani Sarkar