Hallmarks and hallmark moments

A piece of “family silver” often reveals its most important details on the underside. Tucked away on the back, there is often a row of small stamped symbols: a walking lion, a leopard’s head, or an anchor, a single letter in a particular typeface, and perhaps a maker’s initials – all of which appear to be decorative. To those who know the code, it is a complete provenance record – the metal is sterling, it was assayed in a particular location, it was tested in a particular year, and this is the person who made it.

Hallmarking is one of the oldest consumer-protection schemes. The English system has been running, in one form or another, for the better part of seven centuries. As a piece of the design, it is subtle. The mark is standardized, so that the same symbol means the same thing regardless of who struck it. It is difficult to forge, because striking it is controlled by an independent assay office. It survives ordinary handling and wear and tear. Notably, it is readable: not by everyone, but by anyone who cares to learn the code, and by every dealer, valuer, and assay office. A mark that survives but cannot be read is useless; as is a mark that can be read but rubs off the first time someone gives it a clean.

Although hallmarking is medieval, the problem it solves is modern: it closely parallels the challenges the European Union is seeking to address for artificial intelligence (AI).

The EU’s Code of Practice on Transparency of AI-Generated Content (Code) reflects a hallmarking scheme for synthetic content. The Code seeks to make the output of generative AI capable of being identified and understood – to give machines and people a reliable way to tell what was minted by a model and what was not, and to do so in a way that fosters trust in an increasingly complex information ecosystem.

The silver analogy applies: there is the assay office that strikes the mark (the provider of the AI system), the silversmith who sells the finished piece to the public (the deployer), and the shopper looking at the underside of the spoon (the end user trying to understand what they are looking at).

The Code is a substantial document, but its architecture reflects the hallmarking parallel. In this alert, we use that parallel to unpack the Code and its implications for businesses.

You can read the full article at What the EU’s new Code of Practice means for AI-generated content transparency | DLA Piper exploring:
– What is the Code?
– Timings and publication of the code?
– Key considerations for providers
– Detection, durability and interoperability
– What deployers must disclose
– From mark to chain of custody
– Foreseeability, and liability
– Next Steps