Czech Republic - AI Implementation Act

Overview

The Draft Adaptation Act is a short, targeted implementing law prepared by the Czech Ministry of Industry and Trade (MPO) to operationalise Regulation (EU) 2024/1689 (the EU Artificial Intelligence Act) within the Czech Republic. The draft does not replicate the AI Act’s substantive obligations; instead it assigns national institutions, prescribes procedural and language requirements, and establishes enforcement and sandboxing arrangements necessary for the AI Act to function domestically. MPO’s announcement summarizes the approach and rationale; see the Ministry statement at MPO: MPO prepared draft law on AI (26 Sep 2025) and the official VeKLEP/ODok dossier containing the draft and attachments at ODok: Návrh zákona o umělé inteligenci (VeKLEP).

Definitions

The draft uses the definitions contained in Regulation (EU) 2024/1689 for terms such as "AI system", "provider", "operator", "user", "deploy", "placing on the market", "high-risk AI system", and "general purpose AI". It clarifies that where the EU Regulation provides standardised definitions, the national act will apply them verbatim; where the AI Act requires Member State choices (e.g., designation of notifying authorities, language of documentation), the draft supplies those national specifications. The draft also defines national administrative terms (e.g., "oznamující orgán"/notifying authority, "oznámený subjekt"/notified body, "regulační sandbox") in line with the EU text and explanatory materials in the VeKLEP package.

Governance and Institutional Framework

The draft assigns roles and responsibilities across existing Czech agencies rather than creating a new single AI authority. Key appointments and functions in the draft (as explained in MPO and ÚNMZ materials) include: (1) Ministry of Industry and Trade (MPO) as the national coordinator and proposer of the law and national AI policy; (2) Český telekomunikační úřad (ČTÚ) designated as the central market surveillance authority and the public contact point for consumer and market complaints; (3) Úřad pro technickou normalizaci, metrologii a státní zkušebnictví (ÚNMZ) as the notifying authority responsible for designating and supervising notified conformity assessment bodies and registering them with the Commission; (4) Úřad pro ochranu osobních údajů (ÚOOÚ) to exercise market surveillance in areas implicating privacy and data protection; (5) Česká národní banka (ČNB) to supervise AI in entities under its remit (financial institutions); (6) Česká agentura pro standardizaci (ČAS) to establish and operate the national regulatory sandbox. The draft also assigns a human-rights monitoring function to the Office of the Public Defender of Rights (Ombudsman). For MPO’s public announcement see MPO press release and for ÚNMZ’s role see ÚNMZ: Government approved key document (28 May 2025).

Key Focus Areas

The draft focuses on several national choices where the EU AI Act allows discretion: (1) designation of national notifying and market surveillance authorities and the allocation of sectoral surveillance responsibilities (telecoms, privacy, finance); (2) national processes for registration, notification and language of conformity documentation (the draft requires essential conformity documentation and declarations to be available in Czech, Slovak or English when filed with domestic authorities); (3) procedural rules for inspections, requests for information and handling of complaints; (4) creation and governance of a national regulatory sandbox to support innovation while enabling supervised testing and data exchanges with authorities; (5) definitions and administrative categorisation for infractions, including a tailored system for admonitions and reduced fines for minor breaches to support SMEs; (6) accreditation and oversight for notified conformity assessment bodies (to be administered by ÚNMZ and reported to the Commission); and (7) rules on post-market monitoring, mandatory incident reporting and remedies. The draft references EU-level risk classifications (prohibited uses, high-risk systems, etc.)—see the AI Act text at the EU Publications Office for the full regulatory framework (EU AI Act (Regulation 2024/1689) — Publications Office).

Implementation Framework

Implementation is intended through administrative action: MPO will shepherd the bill through inter-ministerial consultation and to government; relevant authorities (ČTÚ, ÚNMZ, ÚOOÚ, ČNB, ČAS) will adopt secondary implementing rules, guidance and technical procedures (e.g., for sandbox admission, notified-body accreditation, and market surveillance coordination). The ODok material package contains the proposed legislative text, the explanatory memorandum and the reasoned justification that show the draft’s minimalist drafting strategy and identify the specific items left for implementing regulation and administrative guidance; access the VeKLEP package at ODok material. The draft also proposes a coordination mechanism for inter-agency cooperation, data-sharing rules for enforcement consistent with data protection law, and a sequence for registering notified bodies with the Commission to enable EU-wide recognition of conformity assessments.

Monitoring and Evaluation

Monitoring combines EU and national mechanisms: providers will continue to file required reports and entries to the EU AI systems database (EU-level), while national authorities will conduct post-market monitoring, inspections and audits. The draft requires domestic authorities to share monitoring results and enforcement data through inter-agency arrangements and to report periodically to MPO. The draft contemplates KPIs for sandbox outcomes, conformity assessment throughput, and enforcement caseloads; it also anticipates a review clause that ties national implementing instruments to EU-level changes (standards, delegated acts and implementing acts).

Penalties, Liability, and Appeals

The draft aligns its administrative offences and sanctions architecture with the AI Act’s enforcement logic but leaves national discretion on the specific administrative penalties in certain cases. It establishes a tiered approach: warnings and remedial orders for minor breaches, administrative fines and suspension measures for serious infringements, and publication of enforcement decisions in more serious or systemic cases. MPO’s public messaging emphasises a proportionate approach with possibilities for admonition and reduced fines for less serious violations to avoid stifling SMEs; see MPO press release. Administrative decisions will be subject to judicial review under Czech administrative procedure rules and applicable appeal routes are provided in the draft explanatory memorandum hosted on ODok.

Relationship to Other Instruments

The draft amends national market surveillance law (it proposes a change to Act No. 87/2023 Sb. on market surveillance) to integrate AI-specific surveillance powers and to allocate responsibilities between existing bodies. It also cross-references Czech data-protection law and the GDPR enforcement roles of ÚOOÚ, banking supervision rules for the ČNB, and sectoral safety laws that interact with AI applications (health, transport). The ODok dossier lists the proposed consequential amendments and difference tables in the material package available at ODok: material.

International Alignment

The draft is explicitly an adaptation of the EU Regulation and is intended to preserve single-market harmonisation while enabling national operational details. Where the AI Act enables Member State choices, the Czech draft selects institutions and administrative procedures so that the Czech approach is interoperable with EU enforcement, notified-body registration and the Commission’s central databases. The draft also preserves compliance with cross-border recognition of conformity assessments and the EU-level prohibition and high-risk framework; it references the EU AI Act text and EU guidance documents available from the Publications Office and Commission pages (EU AI Act — Publications Office).

Implementation Timeline

Sources and References