What are the penalties for non-compliance with the EU AI Act?

The EU AI Act is the most consequential AI regulation in the world, and the penalties are designed to be impossible to ignore. They are calculated as a percentage of global annual revenue, not just EU revenue. For a company with $1 billion in global revenue, a prohibited-practices violation could cost $70 million.

The three tiers: Tier one covers prohibited AI practices like social scoring, real-time biometric identification in public spaces, and manipulative AI. Fines up to 35 million euros or 7% of global revenue. Tier two covers high-risk system violations: AI in credit decisions, employment, healthcare, law enforcement, and essential services that fail to meet transparency, auditability, and human oversight requirements. Fines up to 15 million euros or 3% of global revenue. Tier three covers providing incorrect or misleading information to regulators. Fines up to 7.5 million euros or 1% of global revenue.

The timeline matters: enforcement for prohibited practices is already active. Enforcement for high-risk AI systems begins August 2, 2026. That is not a future problem. It is a current compliance project that many companies have not started.

Claude Guard was built specifically to produce the documentation, audit trails, and governance controls the EU AI Act requires. The cost of compliance is a fraction of the cost of non-compliance.