Deep fakes gay
Government cracks down on ‘deepfakes’ creation
- making a sexually explicit ‘deepfake’ image to be a new offence
- those convicted of this immoral crime face prosecution and an unlimited fine
- latest measure in a huge programme of work to better protect women
Under the new offence, those who verb these horrific images without consent confront a criminal register and an unlimited fine. If the image is then shared more widely offenders could be sent to jail.
The new law will mean that if someone creates a sexually explicit deepfake, even if they have no intent to share it but purely yearn to cause alarm, humiliation or distress to the victim, they will be committing a criminal offence.
It will also strengthen existing offences, as if a person both creates this kind of image and then shares it, the CPS could charge them with two offences, potentially leading to their sentence being increased.
Deepfake images have become more prevalent in recent years, with images being viewed millions of times a month across the world. The spurious images and videos are made to look hyper-realistic wi
To get ahead of new problems related to disinformation and technology, policymakers in Europe and the United States should focus on the coming wave of disruptive technologies, write Chris Meserole and Alina Polyakova. Fueled by advances in artificial intelligence and decentralized computing, the next generation of disinformation promises to be even more sophisticated and difficult to find. This piece originally appeared on
Russian disinformation has become a problem for European governments. In the last two years, Kremlin-backed campaigns have spread untrue stories alleging that French President Emmanuel Macron was backed by the “gay lobby,” fabricated a story of a Russian-German girl raped by Arab migrants, and spread a litany of conspiracy theories about the Catalan independence referendum, among other efforts.
Europe is finally taking action. In January, Germany’s Network Enforcement Act came into effect. Designed to limit hate speech and fake news online, the law prompted both France and Spain to consider counterdisinformation legislation of their have
Deepfakes specifically are a growing issue – with audio clips (which can be harder to find than fake videos) finding particular traction.
In November, Sadiq Khan, the mayor of London, was the subject of a sham audio clip in which he seemed to be making inflammatory remarks before Armistice Daytime, which he later said almost caused “serious disorder”. The previous month, an audio “recording” of Keir Starmer supposedly berating his staff went viral during the Labour party conference, receiving m views on X, formerly Twitter.
The morning before April’s general elections in Pakistan, an audio clip spread on social media of the jailed former prime minister Imran Khan calling for an election boycott – which his party quickly denounced as a hoax. (Four days later Khan, who had been using AI-generated audio to rally his supporters from behind bars, “delivered” an official victory speech via deepfake technology.)
And the US presidential election, coming up in November, has also already been subject to similar interference. In February, an AI-generated mobile message imitating President Biden
Macron shares his deepfakes for AI summit attention
"President Macron's deepfake might seem enjoy harmless fun to promote the AI Summit in Paris, but it is not in general a good thing," says Paul McKay, principal analyst at technology consultancy Forrester.
"Normalising deepfakes in this way should not be encouraged as it continues the difficulty with telling what is real and what isn't, and is ultimately helping to establish what is fact from fiction."
Dr Richard Whittle from Salford Business Institution also warns of the risk of "normalising" deepfakes videos, "both on social media and by scammers".
He adds: "It is fantastic to bring attention to this threat, but doing it in a way that shows how easy it is to create deepfakes risks their wider adoption."
Prof Philip Howard, president of the International Panel on the Information Environment, says AI is increasingly being used "in innovative, sometimes playful ways, as demonstrated by President Macron's recent video."
But he adds: "These kinds of video