It Should Be Illegal To Use AI To Deceive People
Listen to a reading of this article (reading by Tim Foley):
It should be against the law to use generative AI to deceive the public.
I’ve got absolutely no problem with outright government censorship in this case, and I say this as an aggressive and outspoken proponent of free speech. AI products which deceive people should be illegal in the same way fraud is illegal.
I want it to be illegal to knowingly circulate AI video footage and pass it off as real.
I want AI companies to be severely penalized if they don’t prevent people from using their products to generate fake videos that get passed off as real.
I want generative AI companies to be forced to place highly visible warnings across all AI-generated videos with wording that explicitly says they are AI-generated — not just a little watermark in the corner that can be cropped out.
I want AI companies to be harshly penalized if their chatbots encourage users to engage in harmful behavior, or if they tell users they are conscious, or if they psychologically manipulate users into forming emotional attachments to them.
I want it to be illegal for companies to use bots which tell people they are talking to a real human being.
I want it to be illegal for politicians to use AI deepfakes of their opponents saying outrageous things in their political campaigns, as we’ve been seeing more and more often lately.
Your right to extend your fist ends at my nose. These products threaten to erode the fabric of our society. They are attacking people’s ability to understand reality and sort out fact from fiction. They are driving people insane.
If fraud is illegal, than these abuses should be illegal. Fraud isn’t considered protected speech, because it hurts people and is detrimental to a functioning society. Generative AI deception shouldn’t be protected for precisely those same reasons.
Tech plutocrats should not be allowed to profit from sowing deception, confusion, and mental illness. The collective has the right to protect itself from harm from destructive individuals. The state is a gentler tool for this than guillotines. Governments should intervene to end these assaults on our ability to perceive and understand our world.
I really don’t care how much force needs to be used to rein this shit in. If people can’t perceive and understand reality clearly, then everything goes to hell. Nobody knows what to think, how to act, how to vote or how to live if they can’t determine what’s true or false. Bring these new technologies to heel by any means necessary. It’s about basic self-defense at this point.
And I don’t expect any of this to happen any time soon; the rich and powerful are way too excited about generative AI and what it can do for them, and they tend to get what they want. Trump is already drawing significant backlash over reported plans for an executive order which would ban states from regulating AI companies on their own.
So it looks like we’re getting these abusive technologies shoved down our throat in whatever way benefits the zillionaires and Zionists of the imperial power structure, whether we like it or not.
__________________
My work is entirely reader-supported, so if you enjoyed this piece here are some options where you can toss some money into my tip jar if you want to. The best way to make sure you see everything I write is to get on my free mailing list. Click here for links for my social media, books, merch, and audio/video versions of each article. All my work is free to bootleg and use in any way, shape or form; republish it, translate it, use it on merchandise; whatever you want. All works co-authored with my husband Tim Foley.
Bitcoin donations: 1Ac7PCQXoQoLA9Sh8fhAgiU3PHA2EX5Zm2
Feature image via Adobe Stock.
When you've got folks offing themselves after counseling by an AI bot, you know "civilization" has hit the nadir of its capitalistic slime bath. And even the Times runs the story.
CJ>>"It Should Be Illegal To Use AI To Deceive People"
Caitlin, if it isn't AI technologies that are used for this, then it will be OTHER technologies (like language, propaganda, narratives, etc.) to DECEIVE people. You're blaming 'a tool' rather than the SOURCE of the problem - which is 'lack of critical thinking, media literacy, and most of all, the SYSTEM of Capitalism'.
None of the things you mention is likely to be illegal in the US (though China is ACTUALLY making REAL strides in terms of regulating AI) (Watch this video for more on that: "AI for the People? China's Strategy for Technology, Inequality, and the Global South" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cfuGRO6juOY).
People have been manipulated throughout history - be it with religious narratives, or others, be it with newspapers, public speeches, radio, television, movies, the internet and social media, and more. AI is the next evolution of technologies that will be used by those in power to enact and maintain the SAME status-quo systems that have existed BEFORE AI.
If you (or anyone) REALLY wants to fix these issues you mention, then they are likely to achieve BETTER results by focusing on the root/source of the problem, which is 'the easily hackable and manipulable human mind'. There are tools to address this problem (like critical thinking, media literacy, empathy, education, socialism, and more), but how many of 'us' (ordinary people) take the initiative of 'applying these tools' to solve the problem?
Regulation will help, but it will NOT solve the problem (no matter how much I wish it to). People need to TAKE RESPONSIBILITY for their own thoughts, actions, and words. Like you wrote in your recent article, "Nobody's Coming To Humanity's Rescue; We've Got To Save Ourselves", REGULATION is not coming to save us from AI - WE have got to save OURSELVES. People need to TAKE RESPONSIBILITY to 'learn the skills' so as NOT to be taken advantage of by AI technologies (or anything else).
I don't agree with your blanket 'black-and-white' approach to making things illegal - as such technologies (like AI) will be so deeply embedded in human societies (like the internet, cell phones, etc.) and there will be SO MANY nuanced usages of such technologies, that your 'make all this AI stuff illegal' wants/emotions/frustrations deviates from practical feasibility and real-world realities.