US President Donald Trump and First Lady Melania Trump signed a bill against deepfakes and so-called “revenge porn.”
According to CBS News, Trump, along with the first lady, on Monday, signed a bipartisan bill into law, making it a federal crime to post real or fake sexually explicit images or videos of people without their consent.
The bill, known as the “Take It Down Act," was passed by the Senate in February and was backed by Melania during her rare public appearance in March at the US Capitol to advocate to support the bill's approval in the House.
Trump, during the bill signing event at the White House, said, “This will be the first-ever federal law to combat the distribution of explicit imagery posted without subjects' consent. We will not tolerate online sexual exploitation."
AI, a ‘digital candy’ for new generation
The first lady, who also attended the bill signing, called the law a "national victory that will help parents and families protect children from online exploitation" and thanked the bipartisan group of lawmakers “for coming together to prioritise people over politics."
She stressed, “Artificial intelligence and social media are the digital candy for the next generation, sweet, addictive and engineered to have an impact on the cognitive development of our children. These new technologies can be weaponised, shape beliefs and, sadly, affect emotions and even be deadly."
Trump, after signing the bill into law, handed it to his wife to also sign.
The law requires the social media companies and other websites to remove images and videos, including deepfakes generated by artificial intelligence, within two days of the victim's request.
People convicted of intentionally distributing explicit images without consent will face prison time under the new law.
