Guidelines on Artificial Intelligence of Vatican City State (Decree No. DCCII)
Decreto n. DCCII della Pontificia Commissione per lo Stato della Città del Vaticano 16 dicembre 2024, recante “Linee Guida in materia di intelligenza artificiale”
A citation is an address, not a summary. The first part names the law; what follows narrows it to the exact section, article or paragraph.
In force since 1 January 2025.
An AI governance rule binding government bodies.
As of 6 September 2026.
What it requires
- Label AI-generated text, music, photographic, audiovisual, radio, or figurative-art content that a Vatican City State institution disseminates with the acronym 'IA'.
- Do not use an AI system to draw discriminatory inferences about a person, to apply subliminal-manipulation techniques capable of physical or psychological harm, or to deny persons with disabilities access to AI's functions.
- Do not let an AI system replace a magistrate's decision on the interpretation of law, the evaluation of facts and evidence, or the adoption of any judicial measure; use AI only to organize or simplify judicial work or to support legal and doctrinal research.
- Verify and maintain oversight of the data your AI systems process so that outputs remain correct, reliable, and obtained transparently.
If you get it wrong
Criminal exposureNo
Private right of actionNo
Who enforces it
Enforcement body
The AI Commission established under article 14, composed of five members chaired by the Secretary General, monitors application and reports on AI's impact every six months to the Governorate; the decree creates no external supervisory authority.
What it reaches
Obligation class
Prohibition, Content labelling, Governance
What this law does
Drafted with AI from the cited sources under the direction of UnGovr staff. UnGovr holds editorial responsibility for this page.
Decree No. DCCII of the Pontifical Commission for Vatican City State, dated 16 December 2024, promulgates Guidelines on Artificial Intelligence that took effect on 1 January 2025 (art. 2).
The Guidelines bind the Governorate's operational and scientific bodies, its judicial organs, Governorate personnel, and the economic operators, suppliers, bidders and temporary professional appointees engaged under the Vatican's public-contracting decree, within Vatican City State territory or the Lateran Treaty extraterritorial zones (art. 1, paragraphs 1 and 3); they state no general duty reaching an ordinary private business outside that public-contracting relationship.
Article 4 bans seven uses of an AI system outright: drawing discriminatory anthropological inferences about a person; applying subliminal-manipulation techniques capable of physical or psychological harm; denying persons with disabilities access to AI and its functions; creating social inequalities that degrade human dignity; compromising the security of Vatican City State or public order; acting against the mission of the Supreme Pontiff or the integrity of the Catholic Church; and otherwise contravening the Guidelines.
Article 7 requires AI-generated textual, musical, photographic, audiovisual, radio or figurative-art content to be identified with the acronym “IA”, and vests the Governorate with exclusive authorship and economic rights over such content created within Vatican City State territory.
Article 12 reserves to the magistrate alone the decision on the interpretation of law, the evaluation of facts and evidence, and the adoption of any measure, permitting an AI system only for organizing and simplifying judicial work and for legal and doctrinal research.
Article 14 establishes a five-member AI Commission, chaired by the Secretary General, that drafts implementing laws and regulations, opines on proposed AI trials and applications, monitors deployment, and reports on AI's impact every six months; members serve renewable three-year terms. Article 15 calls for implementing laws and regulations within twelve months of the Guidelines' entry into force.
The Guidelines create no external supervisory authority beyond the Commission, state no penalty for a violation, and establish no private right of action.
When LexLint raises it
generates_contenttrains_modelshigh_risk_decisionsprocesses_biometrics
Read the law
Official decree and annexed Guidelines text, published as a PDF at vaticanstate.va