Google’s Bard AI chatbot is now available across the EU, following the tech giant’s compliance with the bloc’s GDPR regulation.
In June, Google was forced to delay Bard’s rollout in the region, after the Irish Data Protection Commission (DPC) demanded stricter privacy measures to ensure the protection of European citizens.
Today, ahead of the release, the chatbot’s Product Lead Jack Krawczyk said that the company has satisfied the DPC demands, providing users with information and control over how their data is being used and stored.
“Google has made a number of changes,” specifically when it comes “to control for users,” the Irish watchdog confirmed.
The 💜 of EU tech
The latest rumblings from the EU tech scene, a story from our wise ol' founder Boris, and some questionable AI art. It's free, every week, in your inbox. Sign up now!
Bard’s expansion to the EU (alongside Brazil) also comes with a series of new features that Google hopes will increase its competitiveness in the generative AI arms race.
Starting today, Bard is available in over 40 languages, including Arabic, Chinese, German, Hindi, and Spanish. Users can also listen to the chatbot’s responses and adjust it’s tone and style to “simple, long, short, professional, or casual.”
In addition, it’s possible to pin and rename conversations, share them with friends, and export Python code to Replit, in addition to GoogleColab. Using images as prompts is now live as well, although currently only in English.
Google Bard’s strongest rivals at the moment are OpenAI’s ChatGPT, Microsoft’s Bing AI, and Anthropic’s Claude 2 — but the list is growing longer by the minute, with both Elon Musk and Meta now having entered the generative AI race. The future has never looked so ominous and so promising at the same time.
Get the TNW newsletter
Get the most important tech news in your inbox each week.