Deepfake AIs shut down as beefed-up social ban looms
Three more AI “nudification” platforms have been removed from Australia, marking the federal government’s plans to strengthen social media age restrictions for the first time in the world.
Services that use existing images to create nude images of real people are being pulled from Australia under threat of legal action, the country’s online watchdog has said.
E-Safety Commissioner Julie Inman Grant said such platforms would be blurred online until age verification was introduced to prevent children from accessing them.
“Age protection is by no means a silver bullet, but it is a critical measure that will help stop children accessing these services and reduce the generation of highly harmful and non-consensual material,” he said.
Seven “nudist” apps that the government plans to eventually outlaw have now withdrawn access or introduced age verification in Australia.
Alongside its crackdown on deepfake AI platforms, Labor is planning further changes to strengthen the social media age limit under 16 to overcome legal challenges and give eSafety greater powers.
Government sources have confirmed that Prime Minister Anthony Albanese plans to announce a further tightening of the ban within weeks.
“This is leading the world, we should be proud of that,” Mr Albanese told Nine’s Today Show on Friday.
“If there are legal challenges, we’re looking for a way to make the laws even stronger.”
Ms Inman Grant has previously called for stronger powers and expressed concerns about the “weak nature” of the ban.
Terry Flew, professor of digital communications and culture at the University of Sydney, said more work was needed to implement the ban, including stricter age verification measures and the regulator being better prepared to take action.
“This exists at both ends of the spectrum. It’s partly about young people and their parents actively avoiding age assurance measures, and partly about companies not taking age assurance seriously,” he told AAP.
Professor Flew said major social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Snapchat, Reddit and
A government-issued digital ID would be the most effective way to verify a person’s age, he added.
The social media ban came into effect in December, aiming to keep children under the age of 16 off online platforms and restrict their access to high-impact content such as pornography.
This policy has been highly controversial among tech companies, due to two separate lawsuits filed by Reddit and a pair of teenagers supported by the Digital Freedom Project.
Although the government says millions of social media accounts have been deleted, recent research has shown that the ban can be circumvented relatively easily.
According to a study published by researchers at Newcastle University on Wednesday, 85 percent of children under 16 reported using social media after the ban came into force.
The report found there was little evidence that young people were using social media less than before the ban.
Mr Albanese acknowledged the ban would not prevent every child from accessing social media but said that was no reason to shy away.
“On a Friday night, somewhere in Australia there might have been someone under 18 who had access to alcohol in a bar,” he said.
“That doesn’t mean we don’t have those rules and laws.”
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