EU AI Act compliance for marketing and creative agencies
Agencies adopted generative AI early and now produce client work with it daily. The AI Act reaches this in two places, and neither is about risk classification.
Article 50 governs labelling of synthetic content, and Article 4 covers the literacy of the people producing it, including freelancers working on your behalf.
Are you a provider or a deployer?
You are a deployer of the generation tools. Where you produce content that your client publishes, both of you have an interest in who carries the labelling duty, so put it in the contract.
How this is classified under the Act
Content production does not fall in an Annex III domain. It sits in the limited-risk tier where transparency obligations apply, so labelling and literacy are the substance rather than conformity assessment.
What changes the answer: Generated material depicting real people needs prominent deepfake disclosure under Article 50(4) regardless of creative intent. Ad targeting that exploits vulnerabilities of specific groups runs into Article 5.
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Run the free 6-question check →Documents you need
- AI Literacy Policy Article 4
A written policy covering which AI tools you use, which roles interact with them, what those people need to understand, who owns the document, and how it gets updated. Enforceable since 2 February 2025.
- Risk Classification Memo Articles 6, 9 and Annex III
A documented assessment placing each AI system in the Act’s risk tiers, including the Article 5 prohibited-practice check and the Article 6(3) exception assessment, with article citations.
- Transparency Disclosure Article 50
Informs people when they are interacting with an AI system and labels AI-generated or manipulated content. Article 50 applies from 2 August 2026. The narrower Article 50(2) duty on general-purpose models generating synthetic content applies from 2 December 2026.
Obligations that apply
- Article 4 Literacy including freelancers
Article 4 covers persons operating AI on your behalf, so contractors and freelance creatives are inside your policy whether or not they are on payroll.
- Article 50(2) Mark synthetic content
Image, audio, video, and text produced by AI and published to an audience has to be identifiable as artificially generated.
- Article 50(4) Deepfake disclosure
Material depicting real persons, places, or events in a potentially misleading way needs prominent disclosure. Artistic and satirical intent does not remove this.
- Article 4 Client contract clarity
Not a statutory requirement, and the practical fix for the recurring argument about who was responsible for labelling a campaign.
Common mistakes
- Assuming client work is the client’s compliance problem, with nothing written down either way.
- Excluding freelancers from the literacy policy when Article 4 explicitly reaches them.
- Using a real person’s likeness in generated material without consent or disclosure.
- Publishing generated imagery with no labelling because it looks stylised.
Where the deadlines stand
The AI literacy obligation under Article 4 and the Article 5 prohibitions have been enforceable since 2 February 2025. General-purpose AI model rules applied from 2 August 2025. The Omnibus, published in the Official Journal on 24 July 2026, moved the high-risk dates: standalone high-risk systems under Annex III to 2 December 2027, and high-risk AI embedded in regulated products under Annex I to 2 August 2028. Article 50 transparency obligations still apply from 2 August 2026. Only the narrower Article 50(2) duty on general-purpose models generating synthetic content moved, to 2 December 2026, which is also when the new prohibition on AI-generated intimate imagery and child sexual abuse material takes effect.
The delay applies to the high-risk obligations. It does not move Article 4, which is why a written AI literacy policy is the document most companies are missing today.
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This page describes obligations under Regulation (EU) 2024/1689 as amended by the Omnibus published in the Official Journal on 24 July 2026, and was verified on 29 July 2026. It is general information rather than legal advice, and classification depends on your specific configuration and use. Review by qualified legal counsel is recommended before formal adoption of any compliance document.