WASHINGTON (NEXSTAR) – Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) on Tuesday introduced bipartisan legislation targeting pornographic photos posted on the internet without a person's consent.
If passed, the Take It Down Act would treat real photos and those created with artificial intelligence the same, and require social media companies to make them private within 48 hours, Cruz said.
“We have purposefully borrowed the legal mechanisms of copyright law and applied them here,” Crews said. “If we put a scene from The Lion King online, it would be taken down immediately.”
The Texas senator said one of his constituents, Elliston Berry, inspired him to introduce the bill.
Berry, 15, was a freshman in high school when an obscene image of her was circulated, and she said someone used artificial intelligence to create it.
“He didn't put his face onto other people's nude photos, instead he used AI to take pictures of real bodies to make the images look more realistic,” Elliston's mother, Anna McAdams, said.
McAdams said she tried to contact Snapchat to have the photos removed but received no response, so she called Cruz's office.
“These images are child pornography,” Cruz said.
Cruz, Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) and 11 other senators from both parties co-sponsored the bill. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said Tuesday that the bipartisan “TAKE IT DOWN Act” is one of his priorities targeting AI imagery.
“We're going to explore ways to move these bills forward,” Schumer said.
Snapchat said it doesn't allow pornography of any kind on its platform and has built-in safeguards to prevent the creation of AI-generated images on the app.
