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Australia launches AI Safety Institute to boost trust in AI adoption

Australia’s AI Safety Institute became operational on 2 June as the government seeks to strengthen public trust in AI development, deployment and governance. The announcement was made during the AFR AI Summit in Canberra, where the government described public trust as essential to building a domestic AI industry.

According to Assistant Minister for Science, Technology and the Digital Economy Hon Dr Andrew Charlton, Australia’s national AI plan rests on three pillars:

Capturing the opportunity
Sharing the benefits
Keeping Australians safe.

The AI Safety Institute is intended to support that effort by testing AI systems, assisting regulators and strengthening public confidence in the technology.

In his speech, Charlton also argued that Australia faces a choice between building a world-class AI industry or relying on foreign capability, while warning that low public trust could slow AI adoption and investment.

Charlton cited survey findings showing that only 30% of Australians believe the benefits of AI outweigh the risks, while 78% are concerned about potential negative impacts, and 36% say they trust the technology. It linked public scepticism to concerns that AI benefits may flow offshore while costs linked to jobs, privacy, power bills, and local communities are borne domestically.

Data centres were highlighted as an example of how trust considerations are shaping AI policy. The government said data-centre developers should contribute new renewable energy capacity, cover an appropriate share of transmission and distribution costs, engage with local communities and avoid creating pressure on water resources.

The AI Safety Institute will analyse and test AI models and applications, support regulators responding to emerging AI-related harms, and contribute to national and international discussions on safe AI development and governance. The speech also pointed to wider work on privacy reform, online safety, workplace impacts, competition, consumer issues, and public-sector AI adoption.

Why does it matter?

Australia is positioning trust as a key component of its AI strategy at a time when governments are balancing economic opportunities from AI with concerns about safety, privacy, employment and infrastructure impacts.

By creating a dedicated AI Safety Institute, Australia joins a growing number of countries establishing specialised institutions to evaluate AI risks, support regulators and build public confidence in the deployment of increasingly capable AI systems.

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France secures a €75 billion SoftBank investment for AI data centres

SoftBank Group has announced plans to develop and operate 5 GW of AI data centre capacity in France, representing an investment of up to €75 billion.

The commitment was announced at the 2026 Choose France summit and marks SoftBank Group’s largest AI infrastructure investment in Europe. The company said the project is designed to expand access to high-performance computing capacity and strengthen France’s role as a European hub for AI infrastructure.

The first phase includes an initial €45 billion investment to deliver 3.1 GW of AI data centre capacity in the Hauts-de-France region by 2031. Planned sites include Dunkirk, Bosquel, and Bouchain, with additional projects expected elsewhere in France.

The infrastructure is intended to support demand for high-performance computing from AI companies, cloud providers, enterprises, public institutions, and research organisations.

A major component of the initiative is a strategic industrial partnership with Schneider Electric. The companies will establish a large-scale industrial production cluster at the Port of Dunkirk focused on data centre infrastructure.

The cluster will include two facilities: one operated by SoftBank Group to manufacture enclosures, and one operated by Schneider Electric to integrate data centre power modules. The partnership will combine SoftBank’s robotics and automation capabilities with Schneider Electric’s energy technology expertise and local supply chain network.

SoftBank said the project is expected to create thousands of high-skilled jobs across data centre development, engineering, energy systems, robotics, operations, maintenance, and advanced manufacturing. The company also plans to support regional research and development through partnerships with universities, engineering schools, and training institutions.

Why does it matter?

SoftBank’s project would significantly expand Europe’s AI compute capacity at a time when data centres, energy infrastructure, and advanced manufacturing are becoming central to AI competitiveness. The investment also links digital sovereignty with industrial policy: France is not only seeking more AI computing infrastructure, but also a localised supply chain for data centre equipment, power systems, robotics, and technical skills.

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European Investment Bank backs Allegro for AI expansion

The European Investment Bank has agreed to provide Polish e-commerce platform Allegro with a PLN 1 billion loan to support research, development, and AI initiatives.

The financing marks the largest private-sector research and development programme backed by the EIB in Poland and is intended to support Europe’s digital competitiveness and digital sovereignty.

The funding will cover nearly 40% of Allegro’s planned expenditure on research, development, and innovation in the coming years. The company plans to expand its use of AI, improve customer services, develop next-generation delivery systems, and strengthen its digital marketplace.

The investment forms part of the EIB Group’s TechEU initiative, which aims to support investment in strategic technologies, including AI, clean technology, and quantum computing. Allegro said the financing will support work by software engineers, data scientists, and AI specialists, while helping the company develop new algorithms, models, and system architectures.

Allegro is one of Europe’s largest homegrown online marketplaces and controls about a third of the Polish market. It is also expanding in Czechia, Slovakia, and Hungary, giving small and medium-sized enterprises access to new customers across the region.

The EIB said planned investments in several technical centres in Poland would also support social and territorial cohesion in the EU.

Why does it matter?

The loan shows how EU-backed financing is being used to support AI adoption and digital innovation in European platform companies. For the EIB, the Allegro deal fits into a wider push to strengthen Europe’s digital and industrial competitiveness through investment in strategic technologies. For Central and Eastern Europe, it also supports regional digital infrastructure, technical skills, and marketplace innovation.

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UNESCO expands ICT skills training to accelerate digital education in Tanzania

UNESCO, with support from the Republic of Korea and the Government of Tanzania, has trained 52 teachers in Dodoma to improve the use of digital technologies in classroom teaching and learning.

The four-day programme focused on implementing Tanzania’s 2025 ICT Competency Standards for Teachers through digital learning modules developed by the Tanzania Institute of Education. Teachers specialising in ICT, physics, mathematics and chemistry received practical instruction on digital teaching tools, online assessment techniques, educational technologies and open educational resources.

Participants highlighted the value of learning platforms and tools such as video recording applications, interactive quiz systems and collaborative digital learning environments. The programme aimed to help teachers use technology more effectively to improve classroom engagement, teaching quality and student learning outcomes.

Why does it matter?

Digital skills are becoming increasingly important across education systems worldwide. By equipping educators with practical ICT competencies, Tanzania is strengthening its ability to deliver modern, technology-enabled education.

The UNESCO initiative also supports broader efforts to reduce digital divides and build national capacity in education, particularly as countries increasingly integrate technology into teaching, learning and workforce development strategies.

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China showcases AI innovation and global cooperation at World Intelligence Expo 2026

The 2026 World Intelligence Expo has opened in Tianjin, bringing together more than 700 exhibitors to present AI technologies, products, and application scenarios.

The four-day event is co-hosted by the municipal governments of Tianjin and Chongqing under the theme ‘Intelligence: Extensive Development Space, Sustainable Growth Driver’. It features seven exhibition zones covering embodied AI, core AI technologies, the low-altitude economy, commercial space exploration, and other emerging technology areas.

Chinese officials used the event to emphasise the integration of AI into manufacturing, industrial operations, and the broader digital economy. Ke Jixin, Vice Minister of Industry and Information Technology, said the ministry would advance the ‘AI+ manufacturing’ initiative, strengthen innovation capabilities, and improve the industrial environment for AI development.

A major focus of the expo is developing high-quality datasets to support intelligent manufacturing. Liu Liehong, head of the National Data Administration, said China would support industry leaders and pilot entities in building sector-specific datasets in areas including automobile manufacturing, shipbuilding, rail transit, non-ferrous metals, and petrochemicals.

The event also highlighted China’s interest in expanding international AI cooperation. Chen Jiachang, Vice Minister of Science and Technology, said China is making AI a priority in bilateral and multilateral technology cooperation, including capacity development.

Representatives from countries including the United Arab Emirates and Kazakhstan discussed potential cooperation with China across AI, advanced technologies, the digital economy, the internet of things, fintech, medical technology, and software.

More than 200 new products, technologies, achievements, and research reports are expected to be released during the expo, covering embodied AI, intelligent connected vehicles, the low-altitude economy, smart manufacturing, and smart living.

Why does it matter?

The expo reflects China’s effort to position AI as a driver of industrial upgrading, manufacturing competitiveness, and digital economic growth. The focus on sector-specific datasets is particularly important because data infrastructure is becoming a core part of AI industrial policy. The international cooperation messaging also shows how China is using AI events to strengthen technology partnerships and capacity-building ties, especially with countries interested in smart cities, fintech, healthcare technology, and digital infrastructure.

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UK and France launch AI partnership to transform health research

The United Kingdom and France have launched a science and technology partnership focused on applying AI, advanced imaging, and data science to major healthcare challenges, including women’s health, infectious diseases, and antimicrobial resistance.

The UK-France Strategic Biomedical Alliance in Health and AI will bring together institutions including the University of Oxford, Université Paris Cité, Institut Pasteur, Diamond Light Source, and Synchrotron SOLEIL. The partnership aims to make it easier for British and French institutions to cooperate on biomedical research, share expertise, and develop joint projects and funding bids.

The initiative will support research into conditions such as endometriosis and childbirth-related complications, while also improving the detection and treatment of infectious diseases, including tuberculosis, malaria, emerging viruses, and drug-resistant bacteria. Researchers will use AI, data science, and advanced imaging technologies to support earlier diagnoses, more personalised care, and improved preparedness for future health threats.

Alongside the biomedical partnership, the UK and France are strengthening cooperation in high-performance computing. Nearly £900,000 in UK government funding has been committed to a partnership between the Bristol Centre for Supercomputing, which hosts Isambard-AI, and France’s national high-performance computing body GENCI.

The collaboration is expected to give researchers at both centres access to advanced computing resources and support AI research and scientific discovery across multiple fields.

The UK will also contribute £300,000, matched by €330,000 from the French government, to support early-career researchers living and working in both countries. The mobility funding is intended to strengthen research collaboration, including on Horizon Europe projects.

Imperial College London and the French National Centre for Scientific Research will also sign a separate agreement to collaborate on metabolism research, covering health challenges including heart disease, cancer, and neurodegenerative disorders.

Why does it matter?

The partnership shows how AI cooperation is increasingly being embedded in biomedical research, advanced imaging, and high-performance computing infrastructure. By linking health research with supercomputing capacity and researcher mobility, the UK and France are treating AI as part of a broader science diplomacy and innovation agenda, rather than only as a standalone technology policy issue.

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Amnesty International warns that AI models are built on privacy violations

Amnesty International has warned that major generative AI systems are powered by large-scale data pipelines rooted in mass invasions of privacy.

In a new briefing, ‘Unlawful by Design: Exposing the Human Rights Costs of Generative AI’, the organisation argues that companies developing generative AI tools rely on unlawful web scraping to collect vast amounts of online data, including personal information, often without the explicit consent of the people who created or appear in it.

The briefing examines models powering widely used standalone generative AI tools, including OpenAI’s GPT-3, Google’s Gemini, Meta’s Llama, DeepSeek, and tools by Midjourney and Stable Diffusion. Amnesty says the design choices behind these systems create systemic human rights risks, particularly around privacy, discrimination, freedom of thought, and environmental harms.

Amnesty argues that large-scale scraping and processing of online posts, images, and other personal data infringes privacy by design. It also warns that training datasets drawn from the open web can reproduce and amplify discriminatory content, stereotypes, and prejudices, especially along racial and gender lines.

The organisation also highlights the environmental costs of generative AI development, pointing to rising demand for energy-intensive chips, data centres, electricity, and water. It says AI infrastructure can negatively affect historically marginalised communities when land and resources are used to build and operate data centres.

Amnesty said it wrote to Google, OpenAI, Meta, Stability AI, Midjourney, DeepSeek, Intel, VMware, Microsoft, and Amazon about the findings and related human rights concerns. At the time of publication, it said Microsoft, Amazon, Intel, OpenAI, and Meta had responded.

The organisation is calling on states to prohibit standalone generative AI systems built using unlawful web scraping and to hold companies accountable for human rights abuses linked to the design and deployment of AI systems.

Why does it matter?

The briefing adds a strong human rights framing to the debate over the training data for generative AI. Instead of focusing only on copyright or competition, Amnesty argues that large-scale scraping of personal data raises privacy, discrimination, freedom of thought, and environmental concerns. Its recommendations would significantly raise the stakes for AI developers by treating non-consensual data extraction as a human rights issue requiring regulatory intervention.

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Anthropic opens Milan office, highlights responsible AI development

The US AI company, Anthropic, has announced the opening of a new office in Milan, expanding its European presence alongside existing locations in London, Dublin, Paris, Zurich and Munich. The company says the Italian office will support enterprises, developers and researchers adopting Claude AI while contributing to broader discussions about the societal impact of AI.

The announcement comes shortly after the publication of Pope Leo XIV’s AI-focused encyclical ‘Magnifica Humanitas’. Anthropic highlighted the participation of co-founder Chris Olah in the Vatican presentation, where he discussed the ethical challenges associated with advanced AI and called for wider involvement from governments, academia, civil society and religious institutions in shaping AI’s future.

Anthropic says its technology has already been adopted by several major Italian organisations, including Generali Group, Unipol Group, Angelini Pharma, Bracco Group, Enel Group and Pirelli.

The company also highlighted partnerships with Italian technology firms. According to Anthropic, JAKALA deployed Claude across more than 3,000 users, while Satispay and Bending Spoons have integrated Claude into software development workflows to accelerate engineering and product development.

Anthropic says the Milan office will help support the AI ecosystem of Italy while encouraging broader debate about how advanced AI technologies should be developed and deployed responsibly.

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European Commission prepares Chips Act 2.0 to boost semiconductor resilience

The European Commission is preparing a Chips Act 2.0 aimed at strengthening Europe’s semiconductor resilience, reducing strategic dependencies, and supporting technological sovereignty.

The initiative builds on earlier legislation introduced after pandemic-related supply chain disruptions, but seeks to address persistent gaps in advanced chip manufacturing and fragmented governance across Member States.

A key focus of the revised framework is expanding Europe’s capacity in advanced semiconductors, particularly chips below 10 nanometres that are used in AI, high-performance computing, defence and advanced automotive systems.

The proposal also aims to improve monitoring of supply chains and market actors, while simplifying regulatory processes and enhancing investment conditions for strategic semiconductor projects.

Alongside production capacity, the initiative is expected to strengthen oversight of supply chain risks and improve crisis preparedness within the EU semiconductor ecosystem. Policymakers have identified limited visibility into supply-chain risks, including technology leakage and dependence on suppliers outside the EU, as a structural weakness.

The initiative is also expected to form part of the EU’s broader digital sovereignty agenda, including support for semiconductor research, chip design capabilities and cross-border industrial coordination.

Why does it matter?

Semiconductors are essential components in technologies ranging from AI systems and telecommunications networks to defence equipment, energy infrastructure and vehicles. The concentration of advanced chip production in a small number of global locations has heightened concerns about supply-chain resilience and strategic dependencies.

By expanding manufacturing capacity and improving oversight of supply chain risks, the EU aims to strengthen its ability to withstand disruptions while supporting long-term competitiveness in a critical technology sector.

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Spain urges immediate action on global AI governance at UN laboratory launch

Spain has renewed its call for stronger international AI governance following the launch of the UN AI Governance for Humanity Lab in Valencia.

Speaking at the opening event, Minister for Digital Transformation and Public Administration Óscar López said AI must serve peace and people, and warned that governments and international institutions must act quickly if AI governance is to become more than an unfulfilled ambition.

López said science and democracy should work together to ensure AI helps reduce poverty and narrow the industrial divide between the Global North and the Global South. He described the laboratory as a further step in Spain’s commitment to multilateral, ethical, and trustworthy AI development.

The minister also pointed to Spain’s growing role in AI governance, highlighting initiatives such as the Digital Rights Charter, the Digital Rights Observatory, the Spanish Agency for the Supervision of Artificial Intelligence, the EU AI Act, and Spain’s recently approved law on the good use and governance of AI.

The new laboratory, operating under the UN Office for Digital and Emerging Technologies, will act as a global coordination body focused on the impact of AI through international governance, risk assessment, multilateral cooperation, and support for the UN Global Digital Compact.

Based in Quart de Poblet, Valencia, the lab aims to build a shared understanding of how AI is governed across countries, advance interoperability among governance frameworks, and support implementation across regions and sectors. Through reports and recommendations, it will support international scientific panels and inform decisions by the UN General Assembly.

The lab will also support the Valencia Dialogues, a series of technical workshops designed to develop concrete and actionable contributions to the laboratory’s work.

Why does it matter?

The launch of the UN AI Governance for Humanity Lab gives the Global Digital Compact a more concrete institutional anchor for AI governance work. Its focus on risk assessment, interoperability, multilateral cooperation, and implementation across regions and sectors reflects a growing effort to move global AI governance from principles and declarations towards practical coordination mechanisms.

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