Article 50(2) machine-readable marking and the 2 December 2026 transition
Article 50(2) is the provider duty to mark synthetic audio, image, video, or text in a machine-readable format. Article 111(4) is the only transition: generative systems already placed on the market before 2 August 2026 have until 2 December 2026. Teams keep treating 2 December as “when marking starts.” That is wrong for anything you launched on or after 2 August 2026.
Educational resource only — not legal advice. scm.cc publishes a readiness report and engineering gap analysis for AI features. It does not give legal advice, represent you before a regulator, or state that a product is ready to ship under any law. This page is educational product guidance, not legal advice. It is not a readiness report, not an engineering gap analysis of your systems, and not a determination that any product meets a legal duty. Confirm current official text before you ship.
Last checked against official sources: .
Who must mark
Providers of AI systems, including general-purpose AI systems, generating synthetic audio, image, video or text. The duty sits with the provider of the generator, not with every downstream website that pastes the output — those sites may have 50(4) deployer duties instead.
What “placed on the market before 2 August 2026” means
“Placing on the market” is the first making available of the system on the Union market (Article 3). A new major version that is a different system can restart the clock. A hotfix that does not change the generative nature of the system usually does not. Confirm the official definition before you claim the December date.
Engineering notes that are not legal advice
Persist the mark through export. A watermark that dies when the user downloads a PNG is not robust. Prefer an industry credential (C2PA) or an equivalent that survives common transforms “as far as technically feasible.” Document the residual cases you cannot mark — Article 50(2) itself acknowledges technical limits.
Questions teams ask
- Does the December date delay chatbot disclosure?
- No. Article 111(4) names Article 50(2) only. Article 50(1), 50(3), and 50(4) applied on 2 August 2026.
- We launched the image model on 15 August 2026. Do we get until December?
- No. The transition is only for systems placed on the market before 2 August 2026.
Related pages
Primary sources
- Article 50 — AI Act Service Desk (Commission)
- Article 111 — AI Act Service Desk (Commission)
- Consolidated AI Act text (EUR-Lex, 27 July 2026)
Official text wins. Last checked 2026-10-11. This page is educational product guidance, not legal advice. It is not a readiness report, not an engineering gap analysis of your systems, and not a determination that any product meets a legal duty. Confirm current official text before you ship.