US senators have proposed a bill that they say would
"criminalize the
spread
of nonconsensual, sexualized images generated by [so-called] artificial intelligence." I agree
with the goal, but a vagueness hides a dangerous detail in the bill.
I support criminalizing the making, publication and republication of nude deepfakes without the
subject's permission. Any deepfake that misrepresents the subject's words or actions should
get the same punishment. You have the right to claim someone said or did something, but
creating fake evidence that falsely purports to prove that is the moral equivalent of perjury.
However, to criminalize "receiving" or simply holding on to a copy of
such a deepfake is a broad threat to freedom.
This is not to say that there is anything redeeming about nude or disinformational deepfakes.
Whatever you wish to say, it is wrong to say it that way. But they will be made, and people
will receive them. What then?
To prohibit having a copy of an image or text — any image or text,
no matter what it presents, no matter how disgusting we consider it —
is an attack on history, journalism, and democratic politics.
Ultimately, it becomes an attack on memory, creating the danger that
governments will command people to forget. It becomes an attack on
justice, since people will be ordered to destroy evidence of crimes
they may wish to fight.
If we tolerate a law requiring people to forget one specific kind of material, that would
invite more laws ordering people to forget other things as well. That road leads to tyranny
(China is an example) and puts truth in danger.
It also opens the door to a kind of digital swatting. Once some texts or images (it doesn't
matter which) are designated as criminal to possess, people could accuse you at random of
having some. Then the digital SWAT team will seize all your computers and storage devices to
check for them.
With a physical SWAT team of today, if you're still alive by the time it has ascertained that
there was no need to break into your home, it will leave you in peace with the repair bills.
Being raided by a digital SWAT team would be painful and dangerous too. They might find no
forbidden deepfakes but they could copy your secrets. Worse, they could find something that
you had been sent and did not remember to delete. They could find an email you had not noticed
or with an attachment you had not tried to view, but you could not prove that. And supposing
you could, would that exonerate you?
If Republicans get away with claiming to have won the next election, what sorts of documents or
videos might they punish people for having?
We will all be safer, and democracy safer too, if we establish that no such law can be considered.