Did Article 50 already apply on 2 August 2026?

Yes. The Commission’s Article 50 page and the Article 50 guidelines both state that Article 50 applies from 2 August 2026. The only limited transition is Article 111(4) for 50(2) marking of generative systems already on the market before that date, until 2 December 2026.

Do we have to label content published before 2 August 2026?

The Commission guidelines and subsequent official explainers treat Article 50 as applying to interactions and exposures from the application date; they do not require retroactive relabeling of every historical archive. Confirm the guidelines for your content type before you plan a backfill.

What is the penalty band if we ignore Article 50?

Article 99 sets administrative fines for specified infringements. Transparency failures sit in the band that can reach €15 million or 3% of worldwide annual turnover, whichever is higher. Read Article 99 on EUR-Lex; this page does not compute a fine.

AI Act Article 50 transparency requirements

Article 50 is the transparency chapter that applied on 2 August 2026. It is four duties, not one “label everything” rule. Providers handle interaction disclosure and machine-readable marking. Deployers handle emotion-recognition / biometric-categorisation notice and the deepfake / public-interest-text disclosures.

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: 2026-10-11.

Article 50(1) — tell a person they are talking to an AI system

Providers must design systems intended to interact directly with natural persons so those persons are informed they are interacting with an AI system, unless that is obvious to a reasonably well-informed, observant and circumspect person in context. Law-enforcement systems authorised to detect, prevent, investigate or prosecute criminal offences are carved out, unless the system is also offered to the public to report a crime.

Article 50(2) — mark synthetic audio, image, video or text

Providers of AI systems, including general-purpose AI systems, that generate synthetic audio, image, video or text must mark outputs in a machine-readable format so they are detectable as artificially generated or manipulated. The marking must be effective, interoperable, robust and reliable as far as technically feasible. Assistive standard-editing that does not substantially alter the input, and certain law-enforcement uses, are out.

Article 111(4): if that generative system was already on the market before 2 August 2026, the provider has until 2 December 2026 to meet 50(2). A system placed on the market on or after 2 August 2026 has no extra time.

Article 50(3) and 50(4) — deployer notices

50(3): deployers of emotion-recognition or biometric-categorisation systems must inform exposed persons and process personal data under the GDPR / EUDPR / LED as applicable.

50(4): deployers of a system that generates or manipulates image, audio or video constituting a deepfake must disclose that the content was artificially generated or manipulated. Artistic, satirical or fictional works get a lighter “existence” disclosure that does not hamper enjoyment of the work. Deployers who publish AI-generated or manipulated text to inform the public on matters of public interest must disclose that fact, unless a human review / editorial-control process ran and a person holds editorial responsibility.

Article 50(5) — timing and accessibility

The information in paragraphs 1 to 4 must be provided in a clear and distinguishable manner at the latest at the first interaction or exposure, and must meet applicable accessibility requirements. A footer that appears after the first answer is late. A 4-pixel grey label that a screen reader skips is not distinguishable.

Commission guidelines (20 July 2026)

The Commission adopted guidelines on implementing Article 50 on 20 July 2026 (Communication C(2026) 5054). They are the practical reading aid for “directly interacting,” “synthetic content,” “deepfake,” and the public-interest-text exception. They do not replace the Regulation. A voluntary Code of Practice on transparency of AI-generated content sits beside the guidelines; signing it is one way to show how you implement 50(2) and 50(4), not a substitute for reading the article.

Questions teams ask

Did Article 50 already apply on 2 August 2026?: Yes. The Commission’s Article 50 page and the Article 50 guidelines both state that Article 50 applies from 2 August 2026. The only limited transition is Article 111(4) for 50(2) marking of generative systems already on the market before that date, until 2 December 2026.
Do we have to label content published before 2 August 2026?: The Commission guidelines and subsequent official explainers treat Article 50 as applying to interactions and exposures from the application date; they do not require retroactive relabeling of every historical archive. Confirm the guidelines for your content type before you plan a backfill.
What is the penalty band if we ignore Article 50?: Article 99 sets administrative fines for specified infringements. Transparency failures sit in the band that can reach €15 million or 3% of worldwide annual turnover, whichever is higher. Read Article 99 on EUR-Lex; this page does not compute a fine.

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Primary sources

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.