On May 7, 2025, the European Commission published a Q&A on the AI literacy obligation under Article 4 of the AI Act (the “Q&A”). The Q&A builds upon the Commission’s guidance on AI literacy provided in its webinar in February 2025, covered in our earlier blog here. Among other things, the Commission clarifies that the AI literacy obligation started to apply from February 2, 2025, but that the national market surveillance authorities tasked with supervising and enforcing the obligation will start doing so from August 3, 2026 onwards.
Key considerations from the European Commission’s Q&A on AI literacy are as follows:
- AI literacy requirements apply to all providers and deployers of AI systems. In practical terms, it requires organizations to train anyone directly dealing with AI systems. This requirement covers not only employees, but also, for example, contractors and service providers interacting or using AI systems.
- There are no specific requirements on what an AI literacy programme should include to comply with AI literacy requirements. Yet, the European Commission considers that, at a minimum, an AI literacy programme should:
- ensure a general understanding of AI within the organization;
- consider the role of the organization (e.g., as provider or deployer of AI systems);
- take into account the risk of the particular AI systems provided or deployed in the organization; and
- build AI literacy actions based on the factors listed above, considering, among other things, the staff’s technical capabilities and the context in which the AI systems are used.
- Organizations are not required to issue a training certificate or similar credentials to prove that staff have completed AI literacy training. Internal records of trainings and other initiatives are sufficient.
- Merely relying on AI systems’ instructions for use or asking staff to read them might be ineffective and insufficient to provide an adequate level of AI literacy.
- Organizations whose employees deploy generative AI systems for tasks such as writing advertising text or translating content must comply with AI literacy requirements, including informing staff about specific risks, such as hallucination.
- National market surveillance authorities are tasked with overseeing AI literacy compliance. The AI Act requires Member States to appoint these national market surveillance authorities by August 2, 2025. Although the AI literacy obligation already applies as of February 2, 2025, supervision and enforcement of this obligation by market surveillance authorities will only start on August 3, 2026.
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The Covington team continues to monitor regulatory developments on AI, and we regularly advise the world’s top technology companies on their most challenging regulatory and compliance issues in the EU and other major markets. If you have questions about AI regulation, or other tech regulatory matters, we are happy to assist with any queries.
This blog post was written with the contributions of Alberto Vogel.