UAE establishes lab to develop AI regulations

The President of the United Arab Emirates, Sheikh Khalifa, has issued a federal law authorising the country’s government to grant temporary licences for testing innovations that use emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI). The law is intended to create a framework for developing and testing legislation to govern the use and applications of AI, 3D printing, and other future technologies. A legislation lab, named RegLab, will start working from January 2019, as a ‘safe test environment for new technologies which will then help to establish future laws about their use’, according to Minister of Cabinet Affairs and the Future, Mohammad Al Gergawi. RegLab will look both into updating existing laws and developing new legislation to regulate advanced technologies and their applications, intending to create a secure and innovation-friendly legislative environment. In doing so, it will co-operate with lawmakers and the private sector.