The new copyright, AI and pictures: Article 70 and the Italian path to the EU AI Act

By Emanuela Truffo ( January 20, 2026, 1:46 PM EST) -- The rapid ascent of generative AI has turned the act of “looking” into a legal battlefield. For an AI model to generate a picture, it must first “digest” millions of existing ones. In response to this technical reality, the Italian parliament’s fall 2025 reform introduced Article 70-septies into the Italian Copyright Law (ICL). This provision represents the “Italian path” toward harmonizing national intellectual property law with the landmark European Union AI Act (Regulation (EU) 2024/1689)....