In recent weeks, major tech companies have taken significant steps to address the growing problem of explicit deepfakes, potentially signaling a shift in the industry’s approach to this issue. This comes after sustained criticism from digital safety experts, women’s rights advocates, and legal scholars regarding Big Tech’s perceived role in the proliferation of non-consensual, sexually-explicit deepfakes online.

Meta’s Oversight Board ruled on two cases involving AI-generated explicit images of public figures, mandating their removal and recommending policy clarifications. The Board emphasized the severity of harms caused by such content and suggested replacing vague terms in content moderation policies with clearer language.

Microsoft published a report acknowledging the scale of the deepfake problem and calling for updated legislation to protect citizens from abusive AI-generated content. The company’s vice chair and president, Brad Smith, advocated for criminal penalties for creating and distributing non-consensual intimate images and child sexual abuse material generated by AI.

Google announced significant updates to its search engine to combat explicit deepfakes. These changes include overhauling the reporting process for victims and adjusting the search algorithm to push websites hosting deepfake pornography further down in search results. The company aims to surface high-quality, non-explicit content for queries specifically seeking this type of material.

While these developments have been welcomed by advocates fighting against image-based sexual abuse, it remains to be seen whether they will lead to better protections for victims and a reduction in the volume of such material online. However, these actions suggest that the tech giants are beginning to take the criticisms seriously and may be moving towards more comprehensive measures to address the deepfake abuse epidemic.

As the U.S. Congress considers legislation that would allow victims of “sexual digital forgeries” to sue their abusers, these initiatives from Big Tech may provide hope for a safer internet in the future.

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