Artificial Intelligence (AI) has, unfortunately, made deepfakes — a generated digital image, video, or audio recording that misrepresents someone — an all-too-accessible tool. Now, sexualised images are being created and spread without the consent, let alone knowledge, of the victim. A 2019 study showed that 96 per cent of all deepfake videos were non-consensual pornography. A nude picture on the internet is largely out of your control, even if it’s fake.
Last month, a Member of European Parliament (MEP), Lena Schilling, spoke about the shock of finding fake videos of herself nude, circulating online. She is one of 50 MEPs who have been targets of deepfakes; 46/50 were female. Beyond the extensive emotional toll for women of all ages, Schilling expressed concern that it could discourage women from entering public life.
Indeed, the UN Secretary-General report on Women and Peace and Security, published on October 26, investigated violence against women in politics and public life. It found that 70 per cent of female human rights defenders and journalists globally have reported experiencing online violence in the course of their work. 24 per cent reported online violence assisted by AI. Women’s sexuality is being weaponised against them to amplify their vulnerability.
A student I spoke to recalled being sexually harassed at school when a false intimate image of her was shared: “I felt entirely exploited and at the time embarrassed… I felt as if my privacy and right to protect my body had been ripped from me.” She acknowledged that she was lucky to have assistance from school and police at the time, but warned that not everyone receives that support.
The reach of harm goes beyond adults. In August, The Guardian reported a rising number of children finding explicit deepfakes of themselves online. Rani Govender, a representative at the NSPCC, warned that tech companies need to do more to protect children: “This rise in children reaching out because fake or AI-generated sexual images have been created of them is alarming but also sadly predictable.”
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman recently warned that “some really bad stuff” is coming with AI, yet remains skeptical of government regulation.
The growing volume of reports of deepfakes is part of a wave of data being collected constantly, both overtly and covertly. Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta Glasses epitomise this trend, facing controversy about accommodating constant covert recording, of women and girls in particular.
For Meta, consent is seemingly not a priority.
In September, The Standard reported on Meta’s AI glasses posing a threat to women and girls on the London Tube, with campaigners calling for a ban. The tech giants’ defence claims that a white light on the glasses indicates when recording is taking place, and encourages users to stop recording if someone expresses comfort.
However, Guy Holder, campaigner at Stop Smart Glasses, warned that this puts victims in a vulnerable position and sets a dangerous precedent for consent: “If you don’t say anything, that means you’re consenting to being filmed and the only way to stop that is to challenge that person,” he says. “What kind of power dynamic does that set?”
A Transport for Scotland 2023 report showed that this travel anxiety also applies to Scotland: women and girls described feeling unsafe when using public transport as being “the norm.” One Scottish woman, Michelle De Jager, told The Scottish Sun about the unease she felt realising that she was secretly filmed at work by a stranger wearing Meta glasses: “That’s my workplace, I shouldn’t be filmed without consent. It does feel a bit like an invasion of privacy.”
How are women expected to give consent if they aren’t aware that they are being targeted? This issue of non-consent is only enhanced with deepfakes. They encourage women to be silent and invisible online. The message reads: you’re not safe outside and you need to be invisible online.
A representative from the University of Edinburgh Femsoc acknowledged that deepfakes can harm men as well as women, but concluded that ultimately it is a female frustration: “It is the historic targeting of female-identifying individuals that makes us feel even more exploited and angry at the constant threat to our safety and the ownership of our bodies.”
As of October 30, the Scottish Parliament has opened an inquiry into AI-generated intimate image abuse.
Image by C.Suthorn, licensed under cc-by-sa-4.0, via commons.wikimedia.org.
