Certain AI practices are banned outright under Article 5 of the EU AI Act due to their potential for harm and ethical concerns. These prohibitions aim to protect EU citizens from the most intrusive and potentially abusive uses of AI. 

Under Article 5, these uses and technologies include:

• Subliminal techniques: Deploying subliminal techniques or techniques that are manipulative or deceptive and have the effect or objective of materially distorting those people by impairing their ability to make an informed decision, causing them to make a decision they would not otherwise have taken, in a manner that causes significant harm to them or others (or is reasonably likely to).
• Exploiting vulnerabilities: Exploiting vulnerabilities of specific groups due to age, disability, or social or economic situation – as with subliminal techniques, this must have the effect or objective of materially distorting behaviour and cause significant harm to them or others (or be reasonably likely to).
• Social scoring: Evaluating or classifying natural persons or groups based on their social behaviours or personality characteristics (known, inferred or predicted) leading to either or both, unfavourable treatment of them or others in social contexts unrelated to the context in which the data was originally gathered or that is unjustified or disproportionate to their social behaviour or its gravity.
• Crime profiling: Assessing the risk of an individual committing a crime, based on the profiling of that person and assessing their personality traits (as opposed to using such systems to support a human assessment of the involvement of a person).
• Facial recognition databases: Creating or expending facial recognition databases through untargeted scraping of facial images from the internet or CCTV footage.
• Inferring emotions: Inferring emotions in workplaces and educational institutions (except for medial or safety reasons).
• Biometric categorisation: Categorising natural persons based on their biometric data to deduce or infer sensitive information about them (i.e. their race, political opinions, trade union membership, religious or philosophical beliefs, sex life or sexual orientation) except where based on lawfully acquired datasets (including in law enforcement).
• Biometric identification: Engaging in ‘real-time’ biometric identification systems in publicly accessible spaces for law enforcement purposes, except under specific exempt circumstances.