Lynn, who remains active on social media, thinks the lack of education is a big problem. “Some people don’t even know that it’s not legal to use other people’s photos,” she said. “Most people say, ‘OK, I’ll just use this photo—it’s no big deal.’ And if every case is taken seriously, it will take a long time.”
A legal case
Usually, when people If you think about deepfakes and synthetic media, they immediately turn to the adult or political movie industry, but these synthesiss go far beyond such industries. “It’s not just in the realm of world leaders and national security anymore,” Gupta said. “It’s intruding into the realm of personal identity and personal security.”
As of 2019, users in China are also required by law to be upfront about their use of VR, AI, or deepfake-related media—otherwise, they could be subject to criminal charges. Mind Elon Musk of China, Who has attracted the attention of the Tesla CEO himself? Chinese Musk, known as “马一龙,” or Yilong Ma, was suspended indefinitely on Douyin, the original and separate version of TikTok, last May for failing to disclose with fans that his videos are created using deepfake technology.
In 2020, China adopted Civil Code of the People’s Republic of China, which protects a person’s identity and portrait rights. Moral rights, as defined by Article 990, include a person’s right to his or her name, likeness, reputation, honor and privacy, among other rights. Portrait rights protect a person’s portrait, personal image, and appearance.
“That includes people using technology to fake your likeness, you know, any form of portraiture of you,” said Jeremy Daum, senior fellow at the Paul Tsai China Center, Yale Law School, said. “You can file a civil lawsuit to claim damages. Usually, though, what happens is—law or not—it’s such small potatoes in terms of damage.”
In my case, with my picture or likeness circulating on Taobao, JD and other markets, I will be protected under these Chinese law. In addition, the Cyberspace Administration of China recently announced that all platforms in China that create or provide these types of services currently require a person’s consent to use their voice or images in a deep work.
So China, in general, has strict laws. In contrast, in the United States, California, Texas, New Jersey, New York, Hawaii, and Illinois also have certain restrictions on deepfakes, but they are not all and these laws still leaves room for the wicked to sneak around the regulations. The time has come to establish stronger protections covering international waters. When we talk about media that is going viral in the US or China, we are actually talking about media that is generally accessible globally thanks to the internet.
Lam said that victims of deepfake technologies have no choice but to comply with specific domestic laws. He and his team predict these problems will increase in the coming years, outpacing both China and the US. “We are seeing more gray areas where the law needs to catch up with technology,” he said.
In the end, I learned that anyone can use digital tools and image compositing to copy, paste, and repeat. Bruce Willis and I seem to be no exception.
“I think this is the next version of identity theft,” Gupta said. “And it has only just begun.”
