The most popular artificial intelligence in the world may be banned in several European countries at once

ChatGPT may be blocked in several European countries. Among the countries considering a temporary ban on the chatbot are: Germany, France, and Ireland.

According to information published in the Handelsblatt newspaper, German regulators are considering blocking ChatGPT due to privacy concerns. «Such a procedure is quite possible in Germany as well,» Ulrich Kelber, spokesperson for the Federal Data Protection Commissioner, said in an interview with Handelsblatt, referring to the recent ban on the chatbot in Italy.

Ulrich Kelber said that there are currently no plans to ban chatbots in Germany. However, Kölber's office asked the Italian authorities to provide «additional information on the temporary suspension of access to ChatGPT» to be passed on to German state regulators.

According to Reuters, French and Irish regulators have also contacted their Italian counterparts to discuss the ban on the chatbot. Spanish regulators reported that they had not received any complaints against ChatGPT but did not rule out the possibility of investigating the chatbot.

On March 31, the Italian Personal Data Protection Authority (GPDP) announced a temporary restriction on the use of ChatGPT chatbot in the country. Thus, Italy became the first country in the world to ban ChatGPT.

The decision was made due to the leakage of users' personal data on March 20. The agency noted that the OpenAI chatbot violates EU privacy laws. ChatGPT has no legal grounds for «mass collection and storage of personal data for the purpose of training the program’s algorithms.» The agency also stated that the information provided by ChatGPT does not always correspond to real data.