  We consider a series of legal provocations emerging from the proposed
European Union AI Act 2021 (AIA) and how they open up new possibilities for HCI
in the design and development of trustworthy autonomous systems. The AIA
continues the by design trend seen in recent EU regulation of emerging
technologies. The AIA targets AI developments that pose risks to society and
citizens fundamental rights, introducing mandatory design and development
requirements for high-risk AI systems (HRAIS). These requirements regulate
different stages of the AI development cycle including ensuring data quality
and governance strategies, mandating testing of systems, ensuring appropriate
risk management, designing for human oversight, and creating technical
documentation. These requirements open up new opportunities for HCI that reach
beyond established concerns with the ethics and explainability of AI and
situate AI development in human-centered processes and methods of design to
enable compliance with regulation and foster societal trust in AI.
