United States of America: Issued Interim Final Rule on Artificial Intelligence Diffusion Export including controls on sales of AI chips

On 13 January 2025, the White House issued an Interim Final Rule on Artificial Intelligence Diffusion Export, including controls on sales and export of AI chips. The rule prohibits access to chip exports for stated adversaries, including China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea, and caps exports to approximately 120 countries. It also exempts 18 stated allies from these restrictions, including Australia, Canada, the United Kingdom, France, South Korea, and Japan. The rule’s provisions include streamlined licensing that exempts low-risk chip orders with up to 1’700 GPUs from requiring export licenses and expediting shipments for research and healthcare uses. Trusted entities can obtain "Universal Verified End User" status, allowing them to deploy up to 7% of their global AI capacity internationally, or "National Verified End User (VEU)" status, enabling purchases of up to 320’000 GPUs over two years. Non-VEU entities in non-allied nations face a cap of 50’000 GPUs per country, while government-to-government agreements with aligned nations can double their chip quotas. The rule also establishes stringent security measures to protect sensitive AI model weights from being diverted for adversarial use.