A Telegram user who advertises their services on Twitter will create an AI-generated pornographic image of anyone in the world for as little as $10 if users send them pictures of that person. Like many other Telegram communities and users producing nonconsensual AI-generated sexual images, this user creates fake nude images of celebrities, including images of minors in swimsuits, but is particularly notable because it plainly and openly shows one of the most severe harms of generative AI tools: easily creating nonconsensual pornography of ordinary people.
To people who aren’t sure if this should be illegal or what the big deal is: according to Harvard clinical psychiatrist and instructor Dr. Alok Kanojia (aka Dr. K from HealthyGamerGG), once non-consensual pornography (which deepfakes are classified as) is made public over half of people involved will have the urge to kill themselves. There’s also extreme risk of feeling depressed, angry, anxiety, etc. The analogy given is it’s like watching video the next day of yourself undergoing sex without consent as if you’d been drugged.
I’ll admit I used to look at celeb deepfakes, but once I saw that video I stopped immediately and avoid it as much as I possibly can. I believe porn can be done correctly with participant protection and respect. Regarding deepfakes/revenge porn though that statistic about suicidal ideation puts it outside of healthy or ethical. Obviously I can’t make that decision for others or purge the internet, but the fact that there’s such regular and extreme harm for the (what I now know are) victims of non-consensual porn makes it personally immoral. Not because of religion or society but because I want my entertainment to be at minimum consensual and hopefully fun and exciting, not killing people or ruining their happiness.
I get that people say this is the new normal, but it’s already resulted in trauma and will almost certainly continue to do so. Maybe even get worse as the deepfakes get more realistic.
Not saying that they are justified or anything but wouldn’t people stop caring about them when they reach a critical mass? I mean if everyone could make fakes like these, I think people would care less since they can just dismiss them as fakes.
I think this is realistically the only way forward. To delegitimize any kind of nudes that might show up of a person. Which could be good. But I have no doubt that highschools will be flooded with bullies sending porn around of innocent victims. As much as we delegitimize it as a society, it’ll still have an effect. Like social media, though it’s normal for anyone to reach you at any time, It still makes cyber bullying more hurtful.
Well if you are sending nudes to someone in high school you are sending porn to a minor. Which I am pretty confident is illegal already. I just would rather not search for that law.
I’m wondering if this may already be illegal in some countries. Revenge porn laws now exist in some countries, and I’m not sure if the legislation specifies how the material should be produced to qualify. And if the image is based on a minor, that’s often going to be illegal too - some places I hear even pornographic cartoons are illegal if they feature minors. In my mind people who do this shit are doing something pretty similar to putting hidden cameras in bathrooms.
Here is an alternative Piped link(s):
once non-consensual pornography (which deepfakes are classified as) is made public over half of people involved will have the urge to kill themselves.
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I’m open-source; check me out at GitHub.