CISAC backs its Brazilian member societies and other entities urging the Brazilian Senate to protect authors in an upcoming AI law

CISAC is throwing its support behind a call from Brazil's creative sector for clear rules to protect and remunerate creators in the country's proposed new AI law. This is a moment for Brazil, a global cultural champion, to show its leadership in advancing technology while at the same time ensuring a safe legal framework for its dynamic creative industries.

CISAC is actively working with its members to guide policy makers worldwide on the regulation of AI as it impacts the rights and livelihoods of millions of creators across the world. The European Union set a precedent in its AI Act adopted in February, establishing clear transparency obligations on AI operators. This is a welcome model which can guide legislatures in other countries on the rules for protecting creators.

CISAC strongly supports the Open Letter issued on 8th April by 26 organisations representing the creative sector in Brazil, including its own member societies ABRAMUS, AMAR SOMBRÁS, ASSIM, AUTVIS, DBCA, GEDAR, SBACEM, SICAM, SOCINPRO and UBC. The letter emphasises the three key priorities that are essential to underpin legislation:

• Authorisation - creators must have right to licence the use of their work by AI tools
• Remuneration - creators must be paid for such uses
• Transparency - AI providers must be obliged to inform on the training of copyrighted works.

Below is the Open letter.

_____________________

Brasilia, April 8, 2024

To the Honorable Senators,

The entities whose logos appear in this letter, representatives of the musical, audiovisual, publishing, dramaturgical, and journalistic sectors, as well as class representation entities such as the Brazilian Institute of Lawyers and the Copyright Commission of the Federal Council of the Brazilian Bar Association, present recommendations to be included in bill 2,338/2023, authored by Senator Rodrigo Pacheco and sponsored by Senator Eduardo Gomes, devices to guarantee the rights of creators and performers of artistic works, intellectual works, and protected productions, in order to prevent the misappropriation of the rights of the entire artistic, academic, and journalistic class.

Bill 2,338/2023, presented to establish a Civil Framework for Artificial Intelligence, represents an important legislative initiative and follows the international community's concern to regulate the proper use of Artificial Intelligence, especially Generative AI, to keep third-party rights intact and the full transparency of its development. The European AI Law, passed last month, came with these premises, and its original version, dated 2021, inspired bill 2,338/2023.

There is no doubt that Artificial Intelligence is a fundamental issue for the social and economic development of the country. It is a technology still in development, which must be used with safety, caution, and transparency, mitigating its risks as much as possible.

In the case of Generative Artificial Intelligence, algorithms have been developed to stimulate machine learning, making them capable of producing new content from mining information and data on a large scale in countless existing databases in the digital field.

The repeated training of the tool, fueled by a gigantic volume of information, patterns, languages, and images, allows the availability of new forms and information different from the originals, which, in many cases, makes it difficult to identify the works used.

In this sense, and as a way to preserve society, it is important to guarantee mining through secure, impartial databases, free from ideological trends and accessible without violating the rights of third parties, including intellectual property rights, to prevent improper uses that reproduce harmful models to the legitimate interests of copyright holders.

Furthermore, depending on its use, the harm can fall on society. This is because the manipulation of productions of informative, historical, or professional journalistic content, for example, could be distorted to generate misinformation and fake news, harming public debate, reputations, and brands. Likewise, the appropriation of national cultural content by technological giants in their databases associated with personal data of Brazilians represents a serious threat of hijacking cultural heritage, without any counterpart for creators and the country.

It is common sense that the use of material protected by copyright presupposes the prior license of its respective holders. However, in the case of tools involving AI, especially the so-called generative ones, the massive uses of protected works and productions by intellectual property without prior authorization, in the data mining process for AI development, have been the norm and their main fuel for the generation of texts, images, and productions. This is a clear violation of intellectual property rights, which devalues original works, harms authors and holders, and causes enormous losses to the creative industry, making it imperative to prevent the prevalence of this harmful scenario.

In this sense, the subscribing entities come to request the support of the Honorable Senators in considering the full guarantee of intellectual rights, as a way of preserving the rights of authors and artists, responsible for the formation of National Culture and Social Communication.

In light of this, a fair and protective norm of copyright holders must ensure their exclusive faculty in:

• Consenting, to ensure compliance with the Copyright Law and to know in advance which works and productions will be used in AI training, including journalistic content.
• Controlling, to preserve transparency, responsibility, and the quality of databases, to preserve moral rights and comprehend the results.
• Being remunerated, recognizing the value of creation and the need for proper payment to creators and copyright holders.

Therefore, to guarantee intellectual property rights, proposal 2,338/2023 must have a clear provision to establish that:

1. The use of protected works and productions for data mining and the development of AI tools must be subject to prior authorization.
2. Contents generated by AI cannot resemble or be protected by intellectual property norms.
3. Although the creative industry sectors do not find space for new exceptions and limitations to copyright, if the legislation includes any provision in this regard, the exceptions and limitations of text mining and data and AI tool development must be restricted and subject to the three-step test provided for in Brazilian law and international treaties, which regulate copyright principles, always preserving the prerogative of the copyright holder to authorize or prohibit the use of their work or production. Exceptions should never be considered or used for data mining or commercial training, and non-commercial uses should only be allowed in certain situations established by clear guidelines, without ever admitting unjustified harm to copyright holders.
4. The training of AI systems and the application of algorithms by services must be transparent and allow copyright holders control and monitoring over the usage models of their works and productions.
5. It is important that the rules establish the strict liability of AI developers as the applicable regime for damages caused by the technology.
6. The burden of proof should always fall on AI developers.

There is no doubt that AI will be a strategic tool for economic and social development, but this can never mean the substitution of creation and the centrality of the human being in the face of cultural expressions, which embody the true force of innovation and creativity.

Faced with the proposals presented, the entities request the inclusion in proposal 2,338/2023 of the points mentioned above and reiterate their availability to contribute to parliamentary debate, in order to achieve the appropriate regulatory text.

We take this opportunity to express again our high esteem and consideration for you.

Sincerely,

Sydney Limeira Sanches and Paulo Rosa

<_o3a_p>

Public link

Please use the above public link if you want to share this noodl on another website.