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<\/p>\nA loophole in proposed AI deepfake laws could see predators escape with lesser convictions, Queensland’s Victims’ Commissioner says.<\/p>\n
Legislation introduced to state parliament last month would criminalise the creation of non-consensual sexually explicit images or audio through artificial intelligence or other digital technology.<\/p>\n
It would carry a maximum penalty of three years behind bars for adults, and 18 months for children.<\/p>\n
Attorney-General Deb Frecklington told the House that the government was ensuring the state’s laws kept pace with technology.<\/p>\n
“The target of every deepfake image is a real person \u2014 increasingly, a young person whose natural vulnerabilities and often tenuous grip on self-esteem and confidence collapse with the viral spread of hyper realistic images, videos and audio that implicate them.<\/p>\n
“The bogus content is overwhelmingly sexual in nature, with certain AI tools complicit in the peddling of this filth.”<\/p>\n
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Deb Frecklington says the government is ensuring laws keep pace with changing technology. (ABC News: Luke Bowden)<\/p>\n
But in a parliamentary committee submission, Victims’ Commissioner Kate Connors, while welcoming the crackdown, raised concerns.<\/p>\n
She noted adults who created sexually explicit deepfakes of children would currently be charged under the existing offence of child exploitation material and face up to 20 years in prison.<\/p>\n
Ms Connors submitted the new legislation could overlap with child exploitation laws, “which means an offender could theoretically plead to the lesser new offence”.<\/p>\n
“That would mean that the offender could receive a lesser sentence and not fall under the reportable sex offender scheme,” she said.<\/p>\n
“For cases where there is an adult offending against a child, it would be unlikely that such a reduction in charge would ever be appropriate.”<\/p>\n
Ms Connors recommended the proposed AI deepfake laws not apply to adults who offend against minors, to avoid the overlap.<\/p>\n
Calls for laws to go further<\/p>\n
Addressing parliament, Ms Frecklington said deepfake content “humiliates the victims who have been depicted without their consent”.<\/p>\n
But Ms Connors noted the proposed laws didn’t cover ‘humiliating or degrading’ depictions of people and were limited to sexually explicit images and audio.<\/p>\n
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Artificial intelligence provides an opportunity for anyone to create realistic and misleading content, including fake sexualised material. (ABC News: Berge Breiland)<\/p>\n
She called for the government to go further in its clampdown and expand the scope to include such content.<\/p>\n
“In school environments, anecdotally, many cases which cause harm include content designed to humiliate and exclude and may not necessarily involve sexual content,” she submitted.<\/p>\n
“Limiting the offence to sexual content sends the message to victims of non-sexual deepfake harm that causes humiliation or degradation that their harm is not important.”<\/p>\n
Concerns over intent<\/p>\n
The legislation differs from interstate jurisdictions such as New South Wales and Victoria, where non-consensual intimate images or audio must be created with intent.<\/p>\n
Legal Aid Queensland submitted there needed to be changes to ensure a person was not accidentally acting illegally.<\/p>\n