Could the revision of the European regulation on artificial intelligence (AI Act) help the EU to combat the generation of deepfakes and non-consensual sexually explicit content? In any case, several Member States seem keen to take advantage: in a working document consulted by Agence Europe (see other news), Spain and France explicitly propose incorporating a ban on this type of practice into the AI Act.
The document, dated 11 February, compiles Member States’ comments on the first compromise of the Cyprus Presidency of the EU Council (see EUROPE 13794/8). Among a host of other proposed amendments, Paris and Madrid want to add a paragraph to Article 5 of the AI Act, which lists prohibited practices.
The two proposals are broadly similar: they would prohibit “the placing on the market, putting into service or use of an AI system intended to generate, modify or reproduce sexually explicit content or images of nudity in violation of the dignity, sexual integrity or consent of natural persons, including through the use of deepfake or other multimedia synthesis techniques”.
The French proposal includes an additional mention for any system “that generates child sexual abuse material, whatever the nature or origin of the underlying content”.
Looking back over the last few months, it’s not surprising that the two countries would want to add such a clarification: this winter, the social network X’s AI, Grok, caused a worldwide outcry because of its built-in image generation function, which enabled several thousand users to create sexually explicit deepfakes of women, sometimes even minors, without their consent (see EUROPE 13779/14).
The European Commission opened an investigation into the network at the end of January (see EUROPE 13794/9). The company’s head office in Paris was searched on 3 February as part of a wider investigation by the French judiciary. In Madrid, there are plans to ban access to social networks for under-16s in order to protect them from a world of “pornography” and “violence”.
It remains to be seen whether the Cyprus Presidency of the EU Council will take this proposal into account in its second compromise version. (Original version in French by Isalia Stieffatre)