New Zealand Criminalizes Deepfake Abuse

New Zealand’s parliament is considering the Deepfake Digital Harm and Exploitation Bill, which would criminalize creating and sharing sexualized deepfakes without consent. The proposed law addresses a gap in current legislation, as New Zealand previously lacked a specific offense for this type of abuse. Existing laws require proving intent to cause distress, a difficult standard for victims of image-based sexual abuse.

Deepfakes overwhelmingly target women, with one study finding 98% of online deepfake videos were pornographic and focused on them. The bill expands the definition of “intimate visual recording” to include synthesized images, acknowledging that abuse can occur even without a real recording. However, lawmakers recognize criminalization alone won’t solve the problem.

Numerous apps readily available on app stores allow users to generate sexualized images from ordinary photos. Australia, the United Kingdom, and the European Union are considering bans on these “nudify” apps.

New Zealand may need broader regulations for high-risk AI systems to prevent future harms and address the use of data scraped from the internet. The work to protect individuals from AI-facilitated sexual abuse continues.