UK To Criminalise Sexually Explicit Deep Fakes

UK To Criminalise Sexually Explicit Deep Fakes

In a bid to protect women and girls more, Britain plans to criminally charge creators who share sexually explicit deep fake images, according to a minister on Tuesday.

The government will also designate taking intimate images without consent and installing equipment to that end as new offences, with perpetrators facing up to two years in prison, the Ministry of Justice said.

It is already an offence in the UK to share or threaten to share intimate images, including deepfakes. But currently, it is only an offence to create an image without consent in certain circumstances, such as so-called upskirting.

Victims minister Alex Davies-Jones said “there are current gaps” in the law that the government was responding to.

“We’re making it more robust to protect women and girls,” she told Sky News, adding one in three women in the UK were victims of intimate images of them being made or shared in so-called “revenge porn” attacks.

“It’s awful. It’s horrific. It really, really makes women vulnerable, intimidates them, and these perpetrators of these crimes deserve to feel the full force of the law.”

Deepfakes are images generated or edited using artificial intelligence (AI) featuring real people.

The justice ministry noted “hyper-realistic” deepfakes have proliferated at “an alarming rate” in recent years, “causing devastating harm to victims”.

Experts warn an online boom in these non-consensual deepfakes is outpacing efforts to regulate the technology globally, with a proliferation of cheap AI tools including photo apps digitally undressing women.

Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner was among more than 30 British female politicians found to be targeted by a deepfake porn website, according to a Channel 4 investigation published last year.

Campaigner Jess Davies welcomed the plan, saying “intimate-image abuse is a national emergency that is causing significant, long-lasting harm”.

The new offences will be included in the forthcoming Crime and Policing Bill, which the justice ministry said will be unveiled “when parliamentary time allows”.