EU Labels ChatGPT a 'Very Large Online Search Engine' Under DSA
OpenAI must now mitigate systemic risks to mental health and minors as the EU reclassifies the AI chatbot to trigger stricter oversight.
The European Commission has officially designated OpenAI's ChatGPT as a Very Large Online Search Engine (VLOSE) under the Digital Services Act (DSA). This regulatory shift places the AI chatbot into the strictest tier of EU oversight, requiring OpenAI to actively manage and mitigate systemic risks associated with its platform.
According to the European Commission, the designation was triggered because ChatGPT reached at least 45 million average monthly active users within the European Union. As a VLOSE, OpenAI is now legally obligated to conduct rigorous risk assessments. Specifically, the company must address and mitigate the proliferation of illegal content, as well as negative impacts on the physical and mental well-being of users and the safety of minors.
The Regulatory Framework
The Digital Services Act is a comprehensive framework designed to standardize digital safety across the EU. It utilizes a tiered system of obligations where the level of scrutiny increases based on the size and nature of the service. The most stringent requirements are reserved for Very Large Online Platforms (VLOPs) and Very Large Online Search Engines (VLOSEs). By applying these rules to ChatGPT, the EU is effectively treating the generative AI tool not merely as a novelty or a productivity assistant, but as a primary gateway for information retrieval and distribution.
Implications for AI Governance
This classification marks a pivotal moment in the governance of generative AI. By labeling ChatGPT as a search engine, regulators are acknowledging that AI chatbots curate and distribute information in a manner similar to traditional search engines, thereby inheriting the same societal responsibilities. This forces OpenAI to implement transparency measures and risk-mitigation strategies that go far beyond the voluntary safety guidelines previously adopted by AI labs.
Furthermore, this move sets a significant legal precedent. As other AI developers scale their user bases within Europe, they will likely face similar reclassifications. The EU's approach signals a shift toward a regime where the scale of a user base, rather than the underlying technology, determines the level of legal accountability for the content a system generates or retrieves.
What to Watch
OpenAI must now demonstrate how it will implement these systemic risk mitigations to avoid potential penalties under the DSA. While the designation is now official, the specific metrics the Commission will use to evaluate the success of OpenAI's risk assessments remain a key point of interest. Industry observers will be watching to see if this regulatory pressure leads to more restrictive filtering or more transparent disclosure of how ChatGPT sources and presents information to its millions of European users.