Two bills aimed at regulating artificial intelligence (AI) recently passed the House Technology, Economic Development & Veterans Committee along party lines (8-5). HB 1168 and HB 1170 focus on AI transparency and disclosure requirements, with significant impacts on retailers.
HB 1168 seeks to increase transparency by requiring developers of generative AI systems to publicly disclose detailed information about the datasets used to train their systems. This includes identifying sources, data types, and whether datasets contain copyrighted or personal information.
HB 1170 focuses on informing users when content has been developed or modified by AI. It requires providers of AI systems with over 1 million monthly users to provide public AI detection tools and ensure AI-generated content includes clear, permanent disclosures identifying its origin.
For retailers, these bills could introduce operational challenges. Compliance with disclosure requirements and the use of detection tools may increase costs, especially for businesses using AI in low-risk uses like marketing, customer interactions, and inventory management. Additionally, the broad scope and definitions in both bills could unintentionally sweep retailers into the “deployer” role.
WR, along with other industry groups, actively engaged on both bills, offering reasonable amendments to address retailer concerns. While some minor changes were accepted, the most substantial amendments, improving definitions and exploring alternative enforcement mechanisms, were not adopted.
The legislative process is ongoing, and WR will continue advocating to ensure retailers’ concerns are addressed as these bills progress.
