AI transparency policy template: what it must contain (free skeleton)

From 2 August 2026, Article 50 of Regulation (EU) 2024/1689 obliges you to disclose AI interactions and mark AI-generated content. None of that survives an audit if it lives only in engineers’ heads — you need a written policy that says what you disclose, where, in which languages, and who is responsible. Here is the structure that works, and a skeleton you can paste into your wiki today.

The 9 sections every AI transparency policy needs

1. Purpose & legal basis — name the regulation (Regulation (EU) 2024/1689, Article 50) and link the EUR-Lex source.
2. Scope — which products, features and internal tools are covered; whether you act as provider, deployer or both (Article 3(3)–(4)); territorial scope including non-EU entities.
3. Definitions — AI system, provider, deployer, deep fake (Article 3(60)).
4. Interaction disclosure — your Article 50(1) implementation: notice wording, placement, timing, voice scripts. Steal wording from the disclosure examples guide.
5. Machine-readable marking — your Article 50(2) method for generated media, typically C2PA credentials, plus documented feasibility limits for text.
6. Deep fakes & published text — Article 50(4) visible labels and your editorial-review exemption workflow.
7. Roles & responsibilities— a named owner per obligation. Auditors ask “who” before “what”.
8. AI disclosure register — a living table of every in-scope feature, its disclosure surface, marking method and exemptions claimed.
9. Evidence & review — screenshots, validation reports, retention period, and an annual + per-launch review trigger.

Free skeleton (copy-paste)

[Company] AI Transparency Policy — v0.1
1. Purpose: implement Article 50, Regulation (EU) 2024/1689.
2. Scope: [products/features]; roles: [provider/deployer per feature]; applies to all output used in the EU.
3. Interaction disclosure: all conversational AI shows “[notice text]” at first interaction; voice announces at call start. Owner: [name].
4. Marking: generated media carries C2PA manifests via [tool]; exemptions recorded in the register. Owner: [name].
5. Deep fakes / public-interest text: visible label “[label]”; editorial-review exemption recorded per item. Owner: [name].
6. Register: [link]. Evidence retained [5] years.
7. Review: annually and on every AI feature launch. Approved: [name, date].

Where teams get it wrong

• Policy without surfaces: a beautiful document but the chatbot still says nothing. The policy must point at real UI.
• No exemption records:relying on the “obviousness” or editorial exemptions silently — write the justification down or expect to lose the argument later.
• English only: Article 50(5) clarity implies users must actually understand the notice — localise for your EU markets.
• No evidence: screenshots and marking validation reports are what you hand a market surveillance authority; collect them from day one.

Skip the drafting

The skeleton above gets you started; the full drafting is the slow part. The $49 template pack ships the complete 7-page policy plus the multilingual chatbot copy pack, labelling policy, internal checklist and vendor questionnaire — in DOCX, PDF and Markdown. Or start with the free gap check to see which sections you actually need.