180 countries worldwide can start with Bard. However, Google’s ChatGPT competitor is not coming to the European Union.

The European Union should not cooperate with Bard. This AI chatbot is Google’s answer to ChatGPT. Users from 180 countries worldwide can speak to Bard instantly, but Google ignores the entire EU. As usual, Google doesn’t feel it necessary to explain this geographically inspired choice. Incidentally, the EU is not alone: ​​Canada is not yet allowed to experiment with Bard either.

ethics and rules

There is a chance that Google is a bit suspicious of existing and future European rules. For example, the GDPR already says something about data protection and it seems that the future AI law will also contain rules on AI training and chatbots. None of these rules are grotesque: they mostly revolve around the fact that you can’t easily misuse someone’s personal data and that you have to have some transparency about the data on which the AI ​​is being trained.

Although Google says it attaches great importance to ethical aspects, the current benchmark within Europe seems to be a little too high for Bard. OpenAI’s ChatGPT previously faced Italian regulators who ordered the company to build in more transparency.

By ignoring the entire EU, Google only has to say it’s about ethics and AI without actually sticking to any binding rules. In addition, companies in the US can already experiment with a technology that will undoubtedly play an important role in the future, while competitors in the EU stand on the sidelines.

Bard’s answer

We reached out to Google for an answer and will update this article when it becomes available. In the meantime, Bard himself has revealed why it doesn’t work in the EU. The chatbot understands that GDPR compliance is actually at the heart of the problem. Google would work on a fix and bring Bard to member states as soon as it is in place. The answer came after a question from Germany’s WinFuture asked via a VPN to bypass geo-restriction.