California Governor Signs Bills to Reign in Deepfakes and AI Watermarking

On September 19, 2024, Governor Gavin Newsom of California signed three bills designed to address the ethical concerns surrounding artificial intelligence (AI) and protect individuals from the misuse of digital content. The new laws impose new requirements on AI developers and social media platforms to ensure responsible technology use while safeguarding Californians from harm.  More information about the bills can be found here and we have summarized them below:

• SB 942 by Senator Josh Becker (D-Menlo Park) focuses on helping the public more reliably identify AI-generated content. It requires widely-used generative AI systems to include provenance disclosures in the content they generate. 
• SB 926 by Dr. Aisha Wahab (D-Hayward) creates a new crime targeting AI-generated sexually explicit deepfake content. The bill makes it illegal to create and distribute sexually explicit images of a real person that appear authentic when intended to cause that person serious emotional distress.
• SB 981, also by Dr. Wahab, addresses the issue of sexually explicit digital identity theft. It requires social media platforms to establish a mechanism for users to report sexually explicit deepfakes of themselves; once reported, this content must be temporarily blocked while the platform investigates, and permanently removed if confirmed.