Speed ​​up plans to criminalize fake abuse, ministers said

Baroness Owen of the United Kingdom Parliament speaking in the House of Lords. She is holding sheets of paper and wearing a white jacket.Parliament of Great Britain

Baroness Owen was the youngest member of the House of Lords when she became a peer last year

Ministers have been urged to speed up plans to criminalize the creation of sexually explicit deepfake images.

Conservative Baroness Owen has proposed legislation that would make it a crime to create or request intimate images of people without their consent.

The government has not backed her bill, which would apply to England and Wales, as it plans to introduce its own legislation to tackle the issue next year.

However, Baroness Owen criticized ministers for “delaying action”, saying it was “a betrayal of those who most need our protection”.

A deepfake is an image or video that has been digitally altered using artificial intelligence (AI) to replace one person’s face with another’s.

Baroness Owen said the creation of sexually explicit deepfakes was increasing rapidly, with so-called ‘nudification’ apps readily available online.

Her bill would create new offences, with those found guilty facing a fine and up to six months in prison.

But it is unlikely to become law without government support.

The former adviser to Boris Johnson was the youngest member of the House of Lords when it became equal last yearafter being nominated by the former prime minister in his resignation honors list.

Introducing her bill in the chamber, Baroness Owen said 99% of sexually explicit hoaxes were by women, describing it as a “disproportionately sexist form of abuse”.

She told colleagues that AI means “a woman can no longer choose who owns an intimate image of her.”

“Technology has made it possible for them to be created by anyone, anywhere, anytime, whether or not she agrees,” she added.

The college cited research suggesting that one app processed 600,000 images in its first three weeks, while the largest site “dedicated to deepfake abuse” had 13.4 million hits per month.

Labour’s general election manifesto promised to ban the creation of sexually explicit deepfakes, and Justice Secretary Lord Ponsonby said the government agreed more needed to be done to protect women from this form of abuse.

“But we also need to tread carefully so that any new measures work with existing legislation and, most importantly, effectively protect victims and bring offenders to justice,” he added.

He said the government would deliver on its manifesto commitment and introduce its own legislation next year.

Baroness Owen said she was “devastated” the government was not backing her bill, adding: “I know survivors will feel disappointed.”

“This bill will save lives and delaying action is a betrayal of those who need our protection the most,” she said.

Liberal Democrat peer Baroness Grender said the bill was “essential”, adding: “Women cannot suffer delays on this issue.”

Sharing or threatening to share sexually explicit deepfake images is already illegal in England and Wales under the Online Safety Act, which was passed last year.

The last Conservative government also promised to make creating such images a criminal offence.

However, his proposals ran out of time to become law when a general election was called in May.

Campaigners expressed concern that the proposals would only make it an offense to create such images if someone wanted to cause “alarm, humiliation or distress to the victim”, rather than if the person did not consent to their image being used in this way.

Online safety campaigner Baroness Kidron called on the Labor government to ensure that any new legislation would not require proof of malicious intent.

The crossbencher said: “The only thing we know is that if you have to prove intent, it’s worse than useless.”

Baroness Owen said her bill would be based on consent, so the burden of proving intent would not be on the victim.

Lord Ponsonby said the government was “actively considering” the issue.

However, he added that in a criminal case “the onus is never on the victim to gather evidence or prove the intent of the perpetrator”, and that would be the responsibility of the police and prosecutors.

Andrea Simon, director of the End Violence Against Women Coalition, said any legislation must be based on consent and cover solicitation as well as creation to be effective.

“The public want to see change and the government must now deliver on this manifesto commitment,” she added.