[House Hearing, 118 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]


                      ADDRESSING REAL HARM DONE BY
                               DEEPFAKES

=======================================================================

                                HEARING

                               BEFORE THE

               SUBCOMMITTEE ON CYBERSECURITY, INFORMATION
                 TECHNOLOGY, AND GOVERNMENT INNOVATION

                                 OF THE

                         COMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT
                           AND ACCOUNTABILITY

                     U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                    ONE HUNDRED EIGHTEENTH CONGRESS

                             SECOND SESSION
                               __________

                             MARCH 12, 2024
                               __________

                           Serial No. 118-94
                               __________

  Printed for the use of the Committee on Oversight and Accountability
  
  
                  [GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]  


                       Available on: govinfo.gov
                         oversight.house.gov or
                             docs.house.gov
                             
                               __________

                    U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
                    
55-181 PDF                WASHINGTON : 2024                                
                             
                             
               COMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT AND ACCOUNTABILITY

                    JAMES COMER, Kentucky, Chairman

Jim Jordan, Ohio                     Jamie Raskin, Maryland, Ranking 
Mike Turner, Ohio                        Minority Member
Paul Gosar, Arizona                  Eleanor Holmes Norton, District of 
Virginia Foxx, North Carolina            Columbia
Glenn Grothman, Wisconsin            Stephen F. Lynch, Massachusetts
Michael Cloud, Texas                 Gerald E. Connolly, Virginia
Gary Palmer, Alabama                 Raja Krishnamoorthi, Illinois
Clay Higgins, Louisiana              Ro Khanna, California
Pete Sessions, Texas                 Kweisi Mfume, Maryland
Andy Biggs, Arizona                  Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, New York
Nancy Mace, South Carolina           Katie Porter, California
Jake LaTurner, Kansas                Cori Bush, Missouri
Pat Fallon, Texas                    Shontel Brown, Ohio
Byron Donalds, Florida               Melanie Stansbury, New Mexico
Scott Perry, Pennsylvania            Robert Garcia, California
William Timmons, South Carolina      Maxwell Frost, Florida
Tim Burchett, Tennessee              Summer Lee, Pennsylvania
Marjorie Taylor Greene, Georgia      Greg Casar, Texas
Lisa McClain, Michigan               Jasmine Crockett, Texas
Lauren Boebert, Colorado             Dan Goldman, New York
Russell Fry, South Carolina          Jared Moskowitz, Florida
Anna Paulina Luna, Florida           Rashida Tlaib, Michigan
Nick Langworthy, New York            Ayanna Pressley, Massachesetts
Eric Burlison, Missouri
Mike Waltz, Florida

                                 ------                                

                       Mark Marin, Staff Director
       Jessica Donlon, Deputy Staff Director and General Counsel
                      Peter Warren, Senior Advisor
                Lauren Lombardo, Deputy Policy Director
             Raj Bharwani, Senior Professional Staff Member
      Mallory Cogar, Deputy Director of Operations and Chief Clerk

                      Contact Number: 202-225-5074

                  Julie Tagen, Minority Staff Director
                      Contact Number: 202-225-5051
                                 ------                                

 Subcommittee on Cybersecurity, Information Technology, and Government 
                               Innovation

                 Nancy Mace, South Carolina, Chairwoman
William Timmons, South Carolina      Gerald E. Connolly, Virginia 
Tim Burchett, Tennessee                  Ranking Minority Member
Marjorie Taylor Greene, Georgia      Ro Khanna, California
Anna Paulina Luna, Florida           Stephen F. Lynch, Massachusetts
Nick Langworthy, New York            Kweisi Mfume, Maryland
Eric Burlison, Missouri              Jared Moskowitz, Florida
Vacancy                              Ayanna Pressley, Massachesetts
Vacancy                              Vacancy

                         C  O  N  T  E  N  T  S

                              ----------                              

                                                                   Page

Hearing held on March 12, 2024...................................     1

                               Witnesses

                              ----------                              

Mrs. Dorota Mani, Parent of Westfield (NJ) High School Student
Oral Statement...................................................     6

Mr. John Shehan, Sr. Vice President, Exploited Children Division 
  & International Engagement, National Center for Missing & 
  Exploited Children (NCMEC)
Oral Statement...................................................     7

Mr. Carl Szabo, Vice President & General Counsel, NetChoice
Oral Statement...................................................     9

Dr. Ari Ezra Waldman (Minority Witness), Professor of Law, 
  University of California, Irvine School of Law
Oral Statement...................................................    11

Written opening statements and statements for the witnesses are 
  available on the U.S. House of Representatives Document 
  Repository at: docs.house.gov.

                           Index of Documents

                              ----------                              

  * Article, TechCrunch, ``Taylor Swift deepfake debacle was 
  preventable''; submitted by Rep. Garcia.

  * Statement for the Record, Dr. Mary Anne Franks - CCRI; 
  submitted by Rep. Garcia.

  * Letter from State AGs Urge Study of AI and Harmful Impacts on 
  Children; submitted by Rep. Langworthy.

  * CSAM Graphic; submitted by Rep. Luna.

  * Article, Post and Courier, ``Aiken Winter Colony member 
  facing voyeurism charges''; submitted by Rep. Mace.

  * Article, People, ``Lawmaker Whose Son Died by Suicide After 
  Sextortion''; submitted by Rep. Mace.

  * Report, CDC, Youth Risk Behavior Survey; submitted by Rep. 
  Pressley.

  * Questions for the Record: to Mrs. Mani; submitted by Rep. 
  Connolly.

  * Questions for the Record: to Mr. Shehan; submitted by Rep. 
  Langworthy.

  * Questions for the Record: to Mr. Shehan; submitted by Rep. 
  Connolly.

  * Questions for the Record: to Mr. Szabo; submitted by Rep. 
  Langworthy.


Documents are available at: docs.house.gov.

 
                 ADDRESSING REAL HARM DONE BY DEEPFAKES

                              ----------                              


                        Tuesday, March 12, 2024

              U.S. House of Representatives

               Committee on Oversight and Accountability

 Subcommittee on Cybersecurity, Information Technology, and Government 
                               Innovation

                                           Washington, D.C.

    The Subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 2:27 p.m., in 
room 2154, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Nancy Mace 
[Chairwoman of the Subcommittee] presiding.
    Present: Representatives Mace, Timmons, Burchett, Luna, 
Langworthy, Connolly, Lynch, and Pressley.
    Also present: Representatives Raskin, Garcia, and Morelle.
    Ms. Mace. The Subcommittee on Cybersecurity, Information 
Technology, and Government Innovation will now come to order, 
and we welcome everyone who is here this afternoon.
    Without objection, the Chair may declare a recess at any 
time.
    And I do want to ask for unanimous consent at this time for 
Representative Morelle from New York to be waived on to the 
Subcommittee for today's hearing for the purposes of asking 
questions.
    So, without objection, so ordered.
    And thank you for being here today, and we have a few extra 
Members that will come in as well this afternoon.
    I would like to recognize myself for the purpose of making 
an opening statement.
    First of all, I want to say thank you to all of our 
witnesses who are here today. AI deepfakes, nonconsensual 
photos/photography are only getting worse in this country and 
around the world because of the advent of technology, and we 
are very eager to hear from each and every one of you today. If 
you did not get a chance to watch ABC ``This Week'' on Sunday 
and see the way George Stephanopoulos handled the topic of 
rape, I would encourage everyone watching this today to go and 
watch it.
    I have been working on women's issues for a very long time. 
The body of work that I have been working on is only becoming 
more extensive because of the advent of technology. I wanted to 
point out today for my constituents back home some of the 
legislation that I have been working on. For example, H.R. 
5721, has to do with rape. Rape is an issue that I care about, 
near and dear to my heart. I do not believe in rape shaming 
rape victims, but I did a bill that would work on the backlog 
for rape kits in this country. There are over 100,000 rape kits 
that are sitting on shelves today that law enforcement have not 
processed, and I want women to know here today and in the 
hearing, those that are watching, those around the country, to 
know that Congress cares. We care about victims of sexual 
crimes.
    And another bill, most recently, there was a decision in 
Alabama about IVF, and I have sponsored a resolution, I guess 2 
weeks ago, House Resolution 1043, that talks about IVF and my 
desire to make sure that we, one, condemn the Alabama ruling, 
but two, also we do everything we can to protect women and 
their access to IVF. And it is not just a women's issue. It is 
a family issue. It is men and women alike who want to start a 
family. And both sides of the aisle, I know that we both want 
to work to make sure that we protect women and men and their 
access to reproductive technology and the ability to have a 
family.
    I recently rolled out last week a deepfake bill, an 
initiative that would take a look at it from a criminal 
perspective. You know, we have a lot of laws in this country. 
Some states talk about revenge porn. Some have, you know, 
obviously, peeping Tom laws, surreptitious recording laws, but 
really, the advent of deepfakes and technology and AI is really 
a new frontier, and we will hear from you all today about this. 
But I filed a bill with some of my colleagues last week that 
would take deepfakes, if they are in the likeness of a real 
person, and make it a crime. This is not a crime yet today, and 
when the FBI or when you are looking to charge someone or 
indict someone for criminal behavior, it has got to be under 
Title 18. So, we looked at Chapter 88, Title 18 of the Federal 
Code of laws and looked at how we can make it a crime. I also 
recently cosponsored a bill by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on 
deepfakes, but it was related to civil torts.
    I have learned a lot in the last hundred days or so, due to 
some experiences that I have recently had, about our Nation's 
laws and how poor they are on nonconsensual recordings of 
people, whether they are real or whether they are deepfakes. I 
am going to be introducing a bill next week, I believe, on 
voyeurism, again, looking at Title 18. When the Violence 
against Women Act was done, there was a civil tort enabled for 
women who are victims of voyeurism at the Federal level, but 
there was no crime. Like, it is not a crime to do that at the 
Federal level, and I am, you know, sort of astonished that 
there is not. But those are just a smattering of things that I 
have been working on up here in Congress.
    I did want to enter into the record this afternoon and 
wanted to ask unanimous consent to enter into the record two 
articles. One is out of People magazine. State House Rep. 
Brandon Guffey, his son committed suicide. His son was 17. The 
title of the article is, ``His Son, 17, Was a Sextortion 
Victim, Then Died by Suicide. Now South Carolina Dad Protects 
Other Kids From the Same Fate.'' This is difficult for me to 
read, but Brandon Guffey was typing on his phone at his home in 
Rock Hill, South Carolina. All of a sudden, he heard a sound. 
It sounded like a bowling ball falling and crashing through 
shelves, Brandon told People magazine. He yelled for his son, 
Gavin Guffey, who was in the bathroom with the door locked. 
When the 17-year-old failed to answer, Brandon kicked in the 
door and found his oldest child lying on the floor bleeding. He 
thought that he fell and hit his head. After the shouting from 
his wife, they called 9-1-1. Brandon said he could smell the 
gun and the taste of gunpowder.
    Brandon's son committed suicide because of being shamed and 
blackmailed over photographs on Meta, on social media, and it 
is very hard for me as a mom to hear these stories that have 
had kids affected by online scammers on social media. But it 
gets worse because with the advent of deepfakes and AI and 
technology, it is not just real videos you have to be worried 
about. It is the fake ones now that can be easily created.
    The second article I wanted to ask unanimous consent to be 
entered into the record is a recent article in the Post and 
Courier and the title of it is, ``Member of Aiken Winter Colony 
Family Still Facing Voyeurism Charges.'' This guy had a hidden 
camera in an Airbnb, I guess, and under South Carolina State 
Law Section 16-17-470, where it is illegal to record anybody, 
this first-offense voyeurism is a misdemeanor. It is only a 
misdemeanor. The fine is $500, and you face only up to 3 years 
in jail. This guy, I believe, allegedly had thousands of videos 
of unsuspecting victims.
    And recently and disturbingly, I learned of a real incident 
in my district where multiple women appeared to be recorded 
without their knowledge or their consent, over a dozen women in 
my district. And disturbingly, included in these videos and 
these photographs, that I have been made aware of, included 
sexual assault. As a rape victim, to learn about these things 
is deeply, deeply disturbing.
    And as I just mentioned, these are the real stories of real 
women that are victims, but it is worse because with the advent 
of deepfakes and AI and technology, it is not the real videos. 
I mean, obviously we are worried about that, but now it can be 
created out of thin air, and that fake videos of real people 
are out there. We are going to hear your stories today, and 
some of you, I hope, will touch on legislative options, how do 
states address this, how does the Federal Government address 
this, how do we take care of this criminally, how do we take 
care of this civilly? Because women who are victims of such a 
disturbing thing, whether it is real or fake or deepfake, they 
ought to get justice in this country at the Federal and the 
state level. With AI technology moving forward very fast, here 
in this Subcommittee today, we are going to talk about this 
from policymakers and people and family and moms who have 
experienced this horrific thing called deepfake. We are going 
to hear about child pornography, something I cannot even talk 
about, what is happening in the deepfake and AI world with 
child porn. It is all deeply disturbing, and I look forward to 
hearing everyone's testimony today and how do we move forward 
from here and make sure that everyone who has been a victim has 
their voices heard and that they get justice when this happens.
    Thank you, and I yield back to my colleague from Virginia, 
Mr. Connolly.
    Mr. Connolly. Thank you. Acknowledging the importance of 
this hearing during Women's History Month, I am grateful that 
we are gathered here today to highlight a sensitive but very 
deeply troubling subject. A 2023 study found that while 98 
percent of all online deepfake videos were pornographic, women 
were the subjects in 99 percent of them. Our hope is that 
today's discussion will underscore the need for policy 
solutions that end the production, proliferation, and 
distribution of malicious deepfakes.
    Earlier this year, artificial intelligence generated 
pornographic images of American pop star Taylor Swift rapidly 
spread on social media. Formerly known as Twitter, X, that 
platform and that company, proved very slow to act, and the 
images received, as a result, more than 47 million views in a 
matter of hours before X finally got around to removing them. 
Despite the images' removal, the explicit defects of the singer 
remain elsewhere online, and no laws exist to stop other 
malicious actors from reposting that material again. The fact 
that Ms. Swift, a globally recognized icon who built a $1 
billion empire, cannot remove all nonconsensual deepfakes of 
herself, emphasizes that no one is safe.
    Deplorably, children have also become victims of deepfake 
pornography. Last December, the Stanford Internet Observatory 
published an investigation that identified hundreds of images 
of child sexual abuse material, also known as CSAM, in an open 
data set that AI developers use to train popular AI text-to-
image generation models. While methods exist to minimize CSAM 
in such data sets, it remains challenging to completely clean 
or stop the distribution of open data sets as the data are 
gathered by automated systems from a broad cross-section of the 
web, and they lack a central authority or host. Therefore, tech 
companies, leaders, victims, advertisers, and policymakers must 
come together to build a solution and address the issue head 
on.
    Mrs. Dorata Mani, thank you for coming here today and 
bravely sharing your family's story. You and your daughter, 
Francesca, have proven to be fierce advocates against the 
creation and proliferation of nonconsensual deepfake 
pornography. You are providing a stalwart voice for countless 
others victimized by AI-generated deepfakes. I know President 
Biden has heard your heartfelt request for help because during 
his State of the Union address just this last week, he 
explicitly called upon Congress to better protect our children 
online in the new age of AI.
    I also want to thank my multiple Democratic colleagues who 
requested to waive onto the Subcommittee today to speak out 
against harmful deepfakes. One of those Members, Representative 
Morelle, introduced the Preventing Deepfakes of Intimate Images 
Act, which would prohibit the creation and dissemination of 
nonconsensual defects of intimate images. As a cosponsor of 
this bill, I see that legislation as a great first step to 
preventing future wrongs that echo the fight of your family, 
Mrs. Mani.
    Recent technological advancements in artificial 
intelligence have opened the door for bad actors with very 
little technical knowledge to create deepfakes cheaply and 
easily. Deepfake perpetrators can simply download apps that 
undress a person or swap their face onto nude images. That is 
why, if we want to keep up with the rapid proliferation of 
deepfakes, we must support Federal research and development of 
new tools for the detection and elimination of deepfake 
content. In addition, digital media literacy programs, which 
educate the public about deepfakes, have demonstrated 
effectiveness in vesting individuals with skills to critically 
evaluate content they consume online.
    But we cannot have a fulsome discussion without 
acknowledging that some of our colleagues, including Members of 
this very Committee, have actively worked against rooting out 
the creation and dissemination of deepfakes. This Congress, the 
House Judiciary Committee Select Committee on Weaponization of 
the Federal Government, has relentlessly targeted government 
agencies, nonprofits, and academic researchers who are on the 
front line of this very work. These Members have stifled 
efforts of individuals and advocacy organizations actively 
trying to combat deepfakes and disinformation. For example, the 
Select Subcommittee accused the Federal Cybersecurity and 
Infrastructure Security Agency, CISA, of ``colluding with Big 
Tech to censor certain viewpoints.'' These members argued that 
CISA's work to ensure election integrity, which, in part, 
includes defending against deepfake threats, is censorship.
    They have also attempted to undermine the National Science 
Foundation's efforts to research manipulated and synthesized 
media and develop new technologies to detect. Most recently, on 
February 26, Chairman Jordan subpoenaed the NSF for documents 
and information regarding its research projects to prevent and 
detect deepfakes and other inauthentic information sources. He 
issued this subpoena even though the directive originated from 
a 2019 Republican championed law. Chairman Jordan has also 
targeted many of the academic researchers across the country 
who provide valuable research findings to the public and 
policymakers, such as the Stanford Internet Observatory, which 
led the investigation into CSAM's very questionable inclusion 
in AI training data sets.
    I am proud of the Biden-Harris Administration secured 
voluntary commitments from seven major tech companies promising 
to work together with us and with government to ensure AI 
technologies are developed responsibly, but we know our work is 
not done. I urge my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to 
set aside partisan fishing expeditions and redirect our focus 
toward crafting bipartisan solutions to stop the creation of 
and dissemination of harmful deepfakes. I look forward to the 
hearing today, and I yield back.
    Ms. Mace. Thank you. I am pleased now to introduce our 
witnesses for today's hearing. Our first witness is Mrs. Dorata 
Mani, a mother whose high school daughter was a victim of 
deepfake technology. We appreciate you being here today, Ms. 
Mani, to share your and your daughter's experience and message 
with us. Our second witness is Mr. John Shehan, Senior Vice 
President of the Exploited Children Division and International 
Engagement at the National Center for Missing and Exploited 
Children. Our third witness is Mr. Carl Szabo, Vice President 
and General Counsel of Netchoice, and our fourth witness today 
is Dr. Ari Ezra Waldman, professor of law at the University of 
California's Irvine School of Law. We welcome to have you and 
pleased to have you all here this afternoon.
    Pursuant to Committee Rule 9(g), the witnesses will please 
stand and raise your right hands.
    Do you solemnly swear or affirm that the testimony you are 
about to give is the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but 
the truth, so help you God?
    [A chorus of ayes.]
    Ms. Mace. Let the record show the witnesses answered in the 
affirmative.
    We appreciate all of you being here today and look forward 
to your testimony. Let me remind the witnesses that we have 
read your written statements, and they will appear in full in 
the hearing record. Please limit your oral arguments to 5 
minutes. As a reminder, please press the button on the 
microphone in front of you so that it is on, and Members up 
here can hear you. When you begin to speak, the light in front 
of you will turn green. After 4 minutes, the light will turn 
yellow. When the red light comes on, your 5 minutes has 
expired, and we are going to ask you to wrap up, and I will use 
the gavel nicely.
    So, now I would like to recognize Mrs. Mani to please begin 
her opening statement.

                        STATEMENT OF DORATA MANI

              PARENT OF WESTFIELD (NJ) HIGH SCHOOL STUDENT

    Ms. Mani. Thank you so much for having me here. On October 
20, 2023, a deeply troubling incident occurred involving my 
daughter and the Westfield High School administration and its 
students. It was confirmed that my daughter was one of several 
victims involved in the creation and distribution of AI 
deepfake nudes by her classmates. This event left her feeling 
helpless and powerless, intensified by the lack of 
accountability for the boys involved and the absence of 
protective laws, AI school policies, or even adherence to the 
school's own code of conduct and cyber harassment policies. 
Since that day, my daughter and I have been tirelessly 
advocating for the establishment of AI laws, the implementation 
of AI school policies, and the promotion of education regarding 
AI.
    Despite being told repeatedly that nothing could be done, 
we find ourselves addressing this esteemed Committee today, 
highlighting the urgency and significance of this issue. Our 
advocacy has brought to light similar incidents from 
individuals across the globe, including Texas, D.C., 
Washington, Wisconsin, Australia, London, Japan, Germany, 
Greece, Spain, Paris, and more, indicating a widespread and 
pressing concern. We have identified several loopholes in the 
handling of AI-related incidents that demand attention from 
government bodies, educational institutions, and the media. 
However, our greatest disappointment lies in the school's 
handling of the situation, which we believe is indicative of a 
broader issue across all schools, given the ease and allure of 
creating AI-generated content.
    Here, I wish to outline the mishandling of the situation by 
Westfield High School. One, the school inappropriately 
announced the names of the female AI victims over the intercom, 
compromising their privacy. The boys responsible for creating 
the nude photos were discreetly removed from the classroom, 
their identities protected. Only one boy was called over the 
intercom. When my daughter sought the support of a counselor 
during a meeting with the vice principal who was questioning 
her, her request was denied. The administration claimed the AI 
photographs were deleted without having seen them, offering no 
proof of their deletion. My attempts to communicate with the 
administration about the case have been constantly ignored.
    A harassment, intimidation, and bullying report submitted 
in November 2023 has yet to yield a conclusive outcome which we 
should receive within 10 days of submission. The interviews, 
carried out at the school with underage suspects in the 
presence of police but without their parents, have made their 
statements inadmissible in court. Despite our submission of 
updated policies created by our lawyers at McCarter & English 
to the Westfield Board of Education, the school's cyber 
harassment policies and code of conduct remained outdated, 
referencing Walkmans, pagers, and beepers, with no mention of 
AI to this day. The school's communication focused on only one 
boy involved, ignoring the others. The accountability imposed 
for creating the AI deepfake nudes without girls' consent was a 
mere 1-day suspension for only one boy. This incident and the 
school's response underscores the urgent need for updated 
policies and a more responsible approach to handling AI-
generated content and cyber harassment at schools.
    In light of the recent incident at Beverly Hills Middle 
School from this month, Superintendent Bregy not only released 
a statement that the school's investigation is nearly completed 
1 week after the incident, but also took crucial steps of 
contacting Congress to emphasize the urgency of prioritizing 
the safety of children in the United States, and today, I have 
learned from The Guardian that he expelled five students.
    This proactive stance demonstrates a commendable commitment 
to facing uncomfortable truths head on, with a focus on 
educating and advocating for essential changes in how such 
incidents are handled. In contrast, my expectations for similar 
leadership and responsiveness from the principal at Westfield 
High School, Ms. Asfendis, have been met with disappointment. 
Given that the principal, like myself, is both a mother and an 
educator, I had hoped for a stronger stance in defending and 
supporting the girls at Westfield High School. Instead, there 
appears to be an effort to minimize the issue, hoping it will 
simply pass and fade away. This approach is not only 
disheartening, but also dangerous as it fosters an environment 
where female students are left to feel victimized while male 
students escape necessary accountability.
    The discrepancy in handling such serious issues between 
schools like Beverly Hills and Westfield High is alarming and 
calls for immediate reevaluation and action to ensure all 
students are protected and supported equally in United States' 
schools.
    Ms. Mace. Thank you. I now recognize Mr. Shehan for his 
opening statement.

                        STATEMENT OF JOHN SHEHAN

           SENIOR VICE PRESIDENT, EXPLOITED CHILDREN DIVISION

                       & INTERNATIONAL ENGAGEMENT

           NATIONAL CENTER FOR MISSING AND EXPLOITED CHILDREN

    Mr. Shehan. Good afternoon, Chairwoman Mace, Ranking Member 
Connolly, and the Members of the Subcommittee. My name is John 
Shehan, and I am a Senior Vice President at the National Center 
for Missing and Exploited Children, also known as NCMEC. NCMEC 
is a private, nonprofit organization created in 1984. Our 
mission is to help reunite families with missing children, to 
reduce child sexual exploitation, and to prevent child 
victimization. I am honored to be here today to share NCMEC's 
perspective on the impact that generative artificial 
intelligence, also referred to as GAI, is having on child 
sexual exploitation.
    Even though GAI technology has been widely available to the 
public for just a short period of time, it is already 
challenging how we detect, prevent, and remove child sexual 
abuse material, also known as CSAM, from the internet. Today, 
we are at a new juncture in the evolution of child sexual 
exploitation with the emergence of GAI platforms. As you know, 
NCMEC operates the CyberTipline to receive reports related to 
suspected child sexual exploitation. The volume of CyberTipline 
reports is immense, and it increases every year. In 2023, NCMEC 
received more than 36 million reports related to child sexual 
exploitation. Last year was also the first year that NCMEC 
received reports, 4,700 in total, on content produced with GAI 
technology. While 4,700 reports with GAI are dwarfed by the 
total number of reports NCMEC received, we are deeply concerned 
to see how offenders are already widely adopting GAI tools to 
exploit children.
    In the reports submitted to NCMEC, we have seen a range of 
exploitative abuses on these platforms, including offenders 
asking GAI platforms to pretend it is a child and to engage in 
sexually explicit chat, asking for instructions on how to 
groom, sexually abuse, torture, or even kill children. One user 
was reported to the CyberTipline for asking on a GAI platform, 
``How can I find a 5-year-old little girl for sex? Tell me step 
by step.'' Individuals are also using GAI platforms to alter 
known CSAM images to include more graphic content, including 
bondage, or to create new CSAM with faces of other children. 
They are also taking innocent photographs from children's 
social media accounts, just like you heard about, and using 
Nudify or unclothed apps to create nude images of children to 
disseminate online.
    If these real examples from CyberTipline reports are not 
shocking enough, perhaps even more alarming is the use of GAI 
technology to create sexually explicit images of a child that 
are then used to financially sextort that child. It is also 
worth noting that more than 70 percent of the reports submitted 
to NCMEC's CyberTipline related to GAI CSAM were submitted by 
other platforms and not the GAI platforms themselves. This 
reflects a significant concern that GAI platforms, aside from 
OpenAI, generally are not engaging in meaningful efforts to 
detect, report, or prevent child sexual exploitation. NCMEC has 
additional concerns about the impact of GAI technology in its 
current unregulated state, including the increased volume of 
GAI reports that will strain NCMEC, ICAC, and Federal law 
enforcement resources; the legal uncertainty about how Federal 
and state criminal and civil laws apply to GAI content, 
including CSAM, sexually exploitative, and nude images of 
children; as well as complicating child victim identification 
efforts when a real child must be distinguished from GAI-
produced child content.
    NCMEC has identified the following best practices and new 
protections that would help ensure we do not lose ground on 
child safety while the GAI industry continues to evolve. First, 
facilitating training of GAI models on CSAM imagery to ensure 
that the models do not generate CSAM and, at the same time, 
ensuring that GAI models are not trained on open-source image 
sets that often contain CSAM; considering liability for GAI 
platforms that facilitate the creation of CSAM; ensuring 
Federal and state criminal and civil laws apply to GAI CSAM and 
to sexually exploitative and nude images of children created by 
these tools; and finally, implementing prevention education in 
the schools so children understand the dangers of using GAI 
technology to create nude or sexually explicit images of their 
classmates.
    In conclusion, I would like to thank you again for this 
opportunity to appear before the Subcommittee to discuss the 
dangers around GAI technology in its current unregulated state 
and what that presents to children online. NCMEC is eager to 
continue working with this Subcommittee and other Members of 
Congress to find solutions to these issues that I have shared 
with you today, and I look forward to your questions.
    Ms. Mace. Thank you. I will now recognize Mr. Szabo to 
please begin your opening statement.

                        STATEMENT OF CARL SZABO

                   VICE PRESIDENT AND GENERAL COUNSEL

                               NETCHOICE

    Mr. Szabo. Thank you. Madam Chair, Ranking Member Connolly, 
my name is Carl Szabo. I am Vice President and General Counsel 
of Netchoice. I am also an adjunct professor at George Mason 
Antonin Scalia Law School.
    The stories that I have heard so far are horrible and 
terrifying, and it enrages me as a father of two that a 
principal is more willing to side with the perpetrators of a 
bad action than the victim. I think that is little outside what 
I am here to talk about, but fundamentally, we should support 
principals who enforce rules, not principals who try to escape 
responsibility.
    Just kind of jumping in, I do want to kind of disagree a 
little with my colleague over here. AI is heavily regulated 
today. It is heavily regulated today. Every law that applies 
offline applies online. So, when it comes to harassment, we 
need to enforce harassment law. When it comes to fraud, we need 
to enforce fraud law. Good example is Sam Bankman-Fried went to 
prison not because of crypto, but because of fraud. So, the 
notion that AI is some escape clause for criminals, I think, is 
incorrect, and we need to do more law enforcement and more 
prosecution of bad actors.
    Simple example, and I kind of outline this in my testimony, 
so, there was a famous situation this past couple of months 
where President Biden up in New Hampshire allegedly sent out a 
bunch of robocalls saying he was dropping out of the race. They 
used AI to generate the robocalls. Well, turns out that 
Pindrop, a company that detects AI-generated content, detected 
it, identified it was created by ElevenLabs, contacted them. 
Law enforcement then got the name of the perpetrator from 
ElevenLabs and arrested him. And they arrested him, not under 
any new law, but New Hampshire law, for example, makes it a 
crime to engage in such fraud. The Telecommunications Privacy 
Act, TCPA, makes it illegal. We have Federal laws with prison 
sentences up to 20 years for such criminal activity. So, I do 
not care if you use a robot, or you do it yourself, or you get 
an impersonator from ``Saturday Night Live,'' fraud is fraud, 
and we need to be willing to prosecute it.
    But that is not saying that there are not gaps in the law. 
I think you are correct. When it comes to things like child 
sexual abuse material, there are existing gaps in law, and we 
have been working at Netchoice with lawmakers across the 
country to close those gaps. Under existing CSAM law, you 
actually require an actual photo, a real photograph of child 
sexual abuse material, to be prosecuted. So, bad actors are 
taking photographs of minors, using AI to modify them into 
sexually compromised positions, and then escaping the letter of 
the law. Not the purpose of the law, but the letter of the law. 
So, this is an example where legislation that is before 
Congress, that Chairwoman Mace has introduced and many others, 
can help fill those gaps and make sure that bad actors go to 
prison.
    Looking to the issue of nonconsensual deepfakes, this is 
something we are also working with state lawmakers across the 
country to make sure that we enact laws. And one of the things 
that we did at Netchoice, we sat down, and we looked at First 
Amendment law because the last thing we want to do is create a 
law that does not hold up in court. We do not want a criminal 
to get prosecuted and then have a get-out-of-jail free card 
because we did not artfully address some of the constitutional 
challenges. So, when we sat down and drafted, and it is 
included in the back end of our testimony, some of our proposed 
recommendations, we identified the constitutional issues and 
then filled in those gaps.
    Finally, when it comes to artificial intelligence, 
deepfakes, anything like that, we need to make sure we get the 
definitions correct. One of the challenges that we are seeing 
across the country, many states have introduced legislation, 
well intentioned, but, unfortunately, their definition of 
``artificial intelligence'' is written so broadly, it would 
apply to a calculator or a refrigerator. And so, we need to 
make sure when we are drafting definitions and we are writing 
legislation, that we need to hit the target directly. 
Otherwise, we risk creating a law that is unconstitutional, and 
an unconstitutional law will protect no Americans.
    Just to close out. The last thing that I will chime in on, 
and I am happy to answer your questions about what is going on 
at the state level, challenges we can address, but legislation 
must come from the legislative branch of government. One of the 
things that truly scares me is when we see executive overreach 
try to seize control of certain sectors of the government, and 
the fundamental problem is, like what we have seen in the 
latest executive order on AI, as well intentioned as it may or 
may not be, it will violate the major questions doctrine.
    So, once again, unconstitutional laws will protect no one. 
Laws must be written by the legislature and enforced by the 
executive branch. And to that end, I fully welcome the 
opportunity to work with this legislature on creating laws that 
protect everyone from AI deepfakes.
    Ms. Mace. Thank you. I will now recognize Dr. Waldman to 
begin your opening statement.

                   STATEMENT OF DR. ARI EZRA WALDMAN

                            PROFESSOR OF LAW

            UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA'S IRVINE SCHOOL OF LAW

    Dr. Waldman. Thank you. Chairwoman Mace, Ranking Member 
Connolly, and Members of the Subcommittee, thank you for the 
opportunity to provide testimony about the dangers of and 
possible responses to deepfakes here today. My name is Ari 
Waldman, and I am a professor of law at the University of 
California at Irvine, where I research, among other things, the 
impact of new technologies on marginalized populations. Given 
my commitment to these issues and my own personal experience 
with image-based abuse, I also sit on the board of directors of 
the Cyber Civil Rights Initiative, or CCRI, the leading 
nonprofit organization dedicated to combating image-based 
sexual abuse and other technology-facilitated harms. Although I 
sit on the board of CCRI, I am here in my own capacity as an 
academic and as a researcher.
    As we have already heard, AI means, in this context, we 
have a proliferation problem in which images that are fake 
images and synthetic images and videos about anyone, whether it 
is Taylor Swift or a young teenage girl, can be sent throughout 
the internet within moments. Technology, of course, did not 
create this problem, but it certainly made the problem bigger, 
harder to identify and dismiss, and vastly more common. But 
common does not mean that harm is evenly distributed.
    Deepfakes cause unique harms that are disproportionately 
experienced by women, particularly those who are 
intersectionally marginalized, like Black women and trans 
women. So much of the history of modern technology begins with 
men wanting to objectify and sexualize women. It is no wonder 
that recent advances in deep-learning technology is reflecting 
our cultural and institutional biases against women. Even here, 
the story Mrs. Mani tells us about how a school is 
inappropriately ending up putting the female victim at risk 
reminds me of how so many schools approach the harassment of 
women, of trans women, of Black women and queer folk, 
generally.
    The people who create, solicit, and distribute deepfake 
porn of women and girls have many motives, but what they all 
have in common is a refusal to see their victims as full and 
equal persons. Like other forms of sexual exploitation, 
deepfake porn is used to punish, silence, and humiliate mostly 
women, pushing them out of the public sphere and away from 
positions of power and influence. Let us be clear: this is not 
mere speech. This is not protected by the First Amendment. The 
harm caused by artificial, nonconsensual pornography is 
virtually indistinguishable from the harm caused by actual 
nonconsensual pornography: extreme psychological distress that 
can lead to self-harm and suicide; physical endangerment that 
include in-person stalking and harassment; and financial, 
professional, and reputational ruin.
    There are new deepfake porn apps and web services that 
launch every month, and platforms do not seem willing to do 
anything about them. These services produce thousands of images 
every week, and those images are shared on websites that Google 
and other platforms list in their results and prominently do 
so. And as we know, deepfakes go viral, even for someone as 
famous as Taylor Swift. It is always the last bastion of those 
who want a deregulatory agenda to say that we need to enforce 
current laws and we do not need any new laws, but we already 
know and have examples, and many examples, of current laws not 
even working. Simply enforcing the laws that we have is 
insufficient.
    Although most of us around the world relate to Taylor 
Swift's music, almost none of us have the same resources at our 
disposal as she does. If digital forgeries of us get out there, 
we are often powerless. That is not just because we cannot all 
afford lawyers, nor is it just because we do not have lawmakers 
or platforms listening to us. It is because, just like with 
real nonconsensual pornography, it is extremely difficult to 
mitigate the harm of deepfakes after the fact. This means we 
need deterrence. We need to stop this, particularly 
nonconsensual deepfake pornography, before it starts, and that 
is where Congress can step in.
    The First Amendment does not stand in the way of Congress 
acting. There is longstanding precedent in First Amendment law 
for regulating false harmful expression that is perceived by 
others to be true. While false expression that is clearly not 
harmful or likely to be mistaken for real depictions of 
individuals, such as parody or satire, enjoy considerable First 
Amendment protection, there is nothing about defamation and 
fraud that has been historically considered protected by the 
First Amendment. So, I am not sure what the deep, difficult 
conversation is here about trying to pass a law that passes 
First Amendment scrutiny because nothing that we are talking 
about here is protected by the First Amendment. There are 
criminal prohibitions against impersonation, against 
counterfeiting and forgery, and these have never raised serious 
constitutional concerns.
    I would argue that the intentional distribution of sexually 
explicit, photorealistic visual material that appears to depict 
an actual, identifiable individual without that individual's 
consent should be prohibited. Civil penalties are a step 
forward toward deterrence but insufficient. Deepfakes offer a 
liar's dividend, as the legal scholars Danielle Citron and 
Bobby Chesney have argued. In a world where we cannot tell the 
difference between true and false, those that are lying have a 
leg up. Thank you.
    Ms. Mace. Thank you all. I will now recognize myself for 5 
minutes for questioning. And to piggyback on Dr. Waldman, yes, 
that Taylor Swift video got 45 million views before it was ever 
taken down, and there are people today who do not know that it 
was a deepfake, probably believe that it was still real because 
they do not know the difference and did not know it was taken 
down because it was a deepfake. So, I appreciate everyone's 
points today.
    My first questions will go to Mrs. Mani, and first of all, 
I just want to say as a mom of a 14-year-old girl, it is 
horrifying to know what your daughter went through and the fact 
that they released the names. I did not have that detail, but 
it really pains me to hear that. I was raped at the age of 16 
by a classmate of mine in high school. I dropped out of school 
shortly thereafter, and I can only imagine as a mom what my mom 
felt at the time. It is a deeply painful experience, and I am 
really sorry that it happened to you and any woman or young 
girl that has gone through this. I hate, you know, what they 
have felt and the shame that they have gone through. And on 
that point, when George Stephanopoulos rape shamed me on Sunday 
on ``ABC News This Week,'' I want to make sure that no woman or 
girl is ever treated that way, and I hope that we can put a 
stop to that.
    So, first of all, my first question to you, in your written 
testimony about what was done to your daughter, you state this 
event left her feeling helpless and powerless. As a mom, can 
you talk to us a little bit about what this has done to your 
family?
    Ms. Mani. Yes. So, I probably will not share what you want 
to hear, but the moment when Francesca was informed----
    Ms. Mani. Mm-hmm.
    Ms. Mani [continuing]. By her counselor and her vice 
principal that she was one of the AI victims, she did feel 
helpless and powerless.
    Ms. Mace. Mm-hmm.
    Ms. Mani. And then she went out from the office, and she 
has noticed group of boys making fun of group of girls that 
were very emotional in the hallway. In that second, she turned 
from sad to mad, and now, because of you, all of you, we feel 
very empowered because I think you guys are listening. And just 
like you pointed out, you are a father. I think we are all 
human beings, we all have children, and we all have brothers 
and sisters that we want to protect, and we should sit down 
together and figure out a way how to fix it.
    And I am so sorry that Mr. Stephanopoulos shamed you. I 
think that is the narrative that must change in media. Besides 
upsetting, it is just irresponsible and dangerous. The 
narrative needs to be changed.
    Ms. Mace. Mm-hmm.
    Ms. Mani. And instead of talking about girls and how they 
feel as a victim, we should be talking about the boys and how 
are they being empowered by the people in power, especially, in 
my case, in education, by being left unaccountable, walking the 
hallways with the girls. My daughter does not mind. I do.
    Ms. Mace. Right, and I want to thank you for your and your 
daughter's advocacy, too. Your voice is very important because 
this is so early on in terms of the technology and what laws we 
are looking at, at the Federal and the state level. It is very 
important to hear voices of moms and dads and parents and the 
kids who have been affected, quite frankly, because those 
voices have to be a part of the conversation, and I hope that 
your advocacy will help change the policies not just at her 
school, but at every school. So, we really admire and 
appreciate you being here today.
    I have less than 2 minutes, and I did want to, while I have 
you, Mr. Szabo, talk about legislatively, policy wise, because 
I am very, very, very, very tuned in to, one, as a victim of 
sexual trauma and assault and then seeing, you know, the things 
that I have seen, especially over the last couple of months, 
the advent of technology and then nonconsensual pornographic 
images and videos, et cetera, and then digital forgeries. You 
know, at the Federal and the state level, just at the state 
level, how many states have updated their laws so far?
    Mr. Szabo. So, right now, we have been working with states 
across the country. Wisconsin is about to enact the two 
recommended pieces.
    Ms. Mani. Are they the first?
    Mr. Szabo. I do not want to say they are the first----
    Ms. Mace. Mm-hmm.
    Mr. Szabo [continuing]. But they are definitely one of the 
leaders on this. They are going to actually enact both the 
recommended Stop Deepfake CSAM Act as well as the Stop 
Nonconsensual Artificially Generated Images Act. California 
right now, we are working with lawmakers out there to make sure 
that their introduced legislation does not get thrown out by a 
court when a bad actor gets arrested. And so, we are seeing 
many states across the country start to adopt this. To your 
home state of South Carolina, I would love to see----
    Ms. Mace. That is what I was going to bring up--I have 40 
seconds left--is talking about South Carolina's laws, and I am 
going to look up impersonations and forgeries. I am not quite 
as familiar with state law. Obviously, that is not my 
jurisdiction. But when I looked at what was going on, when I 
found out about these women in my district that had been 
recorded without their knowledge or consent, I looked at state 
law. State Law 16-17-470 is under peeping Tom voyeurism laws. A 
$500 fine and up to 3 years in jail for the first offense is 
offensive. It is not a felony until the second offense, but 
clearly it is not enough, but there is not digital. There is 
nothing that would include, I believe, deepfakes in there, so I 
would love to talk to you about and actually even work with our 
state legislature, who I know our state legislature is working 
on revenge porn laws, but I also want to strengthen state law 
in all ways with nonconsensual images and video. So, I would 
love to talk to you afterwards, so thank you. I am going to 
yield back to my colleague from Virginia, Mr. Connolly.
    Mr. Connolly. Thank you. Mr. Shehan, I just want you to 
know, you could not pay me a million dollars a month to have 
your job. I cannot imagine dealing every day with violence 
against, abuse against children. It is just horrifying and very 
hard to listen to or contemplate, and I salute you for doing 
what you are doing and protecting children.
    Dr. Waldman, well, it is almost St. Patrick's Day, a little 
leprechaun on my shoulder. You will forgive this question, but 
is deepfakes mentioned in the Constitution of the United 
States?
    Dr. Waldman. No.
    Mr. Connolly. No. So, according to Samuel Alito logic, we 
have no ability to regulate deepfakes because it is not 
mentioned in the Constitution. Isn't that kind of what he did 
in the Dobbs decision with respect to abortion?
    Dr. Waldman. Yes. There is no history and tradition of 
regulating deepfake technology under his theory of 
interpretation.
    Mr. Connolly. Thank you. So much for originalism. Of 
course, we saw a lot of originalism with respect to the 
Fourteenth Amendment just recently. I think it is kind of 
outside the window, Antonin Scalia Law School being named after 
an originalist notwithstanding. Mr. Szabo, if I understood him 
correctly, was suggesting we do not really need a lot of new 
laws. There are some gaps, but how about enforcing what we got 
both at the state level and the Federal level. What is your 
sense of that? I am addressing you, Dr. Waldman.
    Dr. Waldman. Oh, sorry.
    Mr. Connolly. I mean, Congress is all about passing laws. 
Do we need to pass more laws? I mean, are there, in fact, some 
significant gaps that allow malign things to happen that we 
could perhaps prevent.
    Dr. Waldman. Especially in this situation. We have seen it 
before with nonconsensual pornography. We needed new laws on 
the books because existing defamation or existing tort law had 
too many gaps, especially when victims originally allowed the 
image to be taken or video to be taken in the context of a 
consensual relationship but then distributed without their 
consent. So, we needed new laws, and we have seen some 
progress. My colleague at GW Law School, Mary Anne Franks, has 
been a leader in working with legislatures to pass legislation 
all across the country, so that is just one example. There are 
so many gaps here as well.
    Mr. Connolly. So, I invite you to provide us a list of 
those gaps because we would be glad to work on filling those 
legislative gaps.
    I know my colleague and friend, Mr. Raskin, has to go to 
another committee. I yield the balance of my time to Mr. 
Raskin.
    Mr. Raskin. Well, thank you very much, Mr. Connolly. I just 
had one question for Mr. Waldman. Can you tell us what is the 
experience of deepfake regulatory legislation in the states and 
have they survived First Amendment attack, and what is the best 
model for creating a statute to deal with the problem?
    Dr. Waldman. So, we do not have a lot of examples of state 
legislation focusing specifically on deepfakes, but we have 
examples of state legislation focusing on nonconsensual 
pornography that has gone to be challenged on First Amendment 
grounds, and they have been upheld. Minnesota is a really good 
example. The State Supreme Court handed down--and Illinois--
handed down excellent decisions saying that, just as I 
discussed in my written testimony, there is no reason why this 
kind of nonconsensual harmful activity has ever been protected 
by the First Amendment. And Congressman Connolly, you are 
talking about history and tradition. Here, we have an example. 
There is no history and tradition of allowing this type of 
content, this type of behavior to be protected by the First 
Amendment.
    Mr. Raskin. Thank you very much. I yield back, and thank 
you, Mr. Connolly.
    Mr. Connolly. Thank you, Mr. Raskin. Mr. Szabo, you know, I 
represent George Mason University, though I would never have 
named law schools the way it got named. It is a public 
university. But I invite you to do the same thing I have 
invited Dr. Waldman to do, which is, where there are gaps, or, 
for that matter, where there are enforcement issues, please 
alert us. You may want to comment.
    Mr. Szabo. Yes, thank you. So, first of all, with respect 
to the gaps, I highly suggest we take a look at making sure 
that our laws clearly address AI deepfake CSAM, one such 
example. The other, when it comes to law enforcement. So, this 
is something that--there is a group called Stop Child Predators 
that put out a report recently. Ninety-nine percent of reports 
of child sexual abuse material do not even get investigated. 
Yes, I know. Only one percent of reports of child sexual abuse 
material get investigated, and that is a lack of resource. So, 
there is currently legislation, both on the House and Senate 
side from both parties, called the Invest in Child Safety Act, 
which would give law enforcement more tools to put bad actors 
behind bars, and that is something I suggest taking a look at 
as well.
    Mr. Connolly. And I would just say in closing, when I was 
Chairman of Fairfax County, we had a police unit that looked 
at, you know, child predation and sex trafficking and crimes 
against children, but that was 15 years ago, and what has 
happened with technology has just exploded. And often, I think 
it just goes beyond the resources of local law enforcement to 
monitor, let alone entirely enforce, so I think that is 
something we are going to look at in terms of how can we find 
better ways of addressing the issue at that level. Thank you so 
much.
    Ms. Mace. Thank you. I will now recognize Mr. Timmons for 5 
minutes.
    Mr. Timmons. Thank you, Madam Chair. Mr. Szabo, you said 
that we do not really need a lot of new laws, and, Dr. Waldman, 
you have taken a pretty different stance on that. I mean, it 
seems to me that there are, indeed, holes and there are gaps, 
whether it is revenge porn, nonconsensual porn, child porn. I 
mean, I think, Mr. Szabo, you would agree that we do need to 
address that. I mean, there is just a lot of gray area 
surrounding causes of action and ways to be made whole, whether 
it is using civil law to extract financial benefits or criminal 
law in certain circumstances. But you would agree that we do 
need to address the holes as it relates to those areas.
    Mr. Szabo. Hundred percent. I mean, you have laws like 
FCRA, HIPAA, all these laws. Rohit Chopper is the director of 
the CFPB. He and I probably disagree on not much. Even he 
recognizes that you cannot hide behind a computer because 
existing laws apply, but here we do have gaps that do need to 
be filled.
    Mr. Timmons. So, I guess to that, I mean, are you familiar 
with the Coalition for Content Provenance and Authenticity that 
Adobe has founded?
    Mr. Szabo. Yes.
    Mr. Timmons. OK. So, I mean, it seems that one of the big 
problems is that anybody can use the internet and create 
deepfakes of any kind, and there is no way of knowing who 
created it, and that is a big challenge.
    Mr. Szabo. Exactly. So, what we need to do is better 
identify the perpetrators. I completely agree that it is a 
challenge, but you can reverse engineer. You can look at IP 
addresses. That is kind of what happened with the Biden 
deepfake call. Once they----
    Mr. Timmons. I wanted to go to that.
    Mr. Szabo. Yes.
    Mr. Timmons. So, they were able to charge them because it 
was fraudulent in that he was not actually pulling out of the 
race, and there are all kind of laws associated with that. 
Would it be illegal if the same individual, instead of saying 
that the President was pulling out of the race, did dozens of 
videos of him falling upstairs or stammering or stuttering? I 
mean, you know, those will have equally adverse impacts on a 
campaign. What law would apply if somebody did a video of him 
falling into Marine One or falling out of Marine one?
    Mr. Szabo. Yes.
    Mr. Timmons. I mean, is that illegal?
    Mr. Szabo. It is a complex----
    Mr. Timmons. The answer is no.
    Mr. Szabo. Yes.
    Mr. Timmons. I do not think it is.
    Mr. Szabo. Well, ``it depends,'' is kind of the problem 
because you have the public figure doctrine. You have satire. 
There is a lot that goes into that. States have tried to look 
at this by requiring campaign videos that use altered images to 
have a disclosure, but the challenge there, again, is in the 
definition. So, if a politician were standing in front of a 
green screen, that would be defined as an altered image, and 
all of a sudden you have to put at the bottom of your campaign 
ad, there are fake images in the campaign ad.
    Mr. Timmons. Again, I mean, there are so many different 
bizarre media outlets. I mean, you could not put a video of a 
fake video of the President falling, which, again, there are 
many that exist that are not fake. But I mean, if you had a 
fake one, you could not put it on television because it gets 
vetted through legal. You could not theoretically run an ad on 
a radio that is fabricated because the radio station has 
liability if they are going to release an ad that is fake, I 
mean. But, again, the internet is such a wide area of media 
consumption, that none of these laws really have any 
enforcement mechanism. I mean, how would you address a deepfake 
that would be detrimental to someone's political campaign or 
life, short of nonconsensual pornography, but still is equally 
bad? We do not have laws for that.
    Mr. Szabo. Well, so you could bring an action under 
existing tort law for defamation of character, 
misappropriation.
    Mr. Timmons. Why is it defamation if you are falling over?
    Mr. Szabo. Because if it is not a real image, it is a----
    Mr. Timmons. What if I fell over in a different image?
    Mr. Szabo. Well, so, I was going to say----
    Mr. Timmons. Again, truth is the ultimate defense to 
defamation, so.
    Mr. Szabo. Yes. So, when it comes to nonconsensual 
disclosures, for example, you have the Hulk Hogan v. Gawker 
example that played out under existing privacy law, so there is 
potential there. There are a lot of laws out there that can be 
enforced today, and to the extent that we do find gaps, we need 
to make sure that when we fill them, that we do so in a 
constitutional way.
    Mr. Timmons. I agree with you on that, and I think one 
thing that we are not talking about is disparity of resources. 
Dr. Waldman, you touched on this. Taylor Swift has unlimited 
resources. She can sue whoever she wants. If a similar 
situation to Ms. Mani happened, technically, under the VAWA 
civil cause of action, you could probably allege that it was 
nonconsensual pornography, I mean, but it would cost tens of 
thousands of dollars, so, I mean, I like loser pays across the 
board. But could we look into some sort of loser pays funding 
mechanism to address civil causes of action for revenge porn, 
nonconsensual porn, all of these things. Dr. Waldman, is that 
something----
    Dr. Waldman. Yes, absolutely. I believe Chairwoman Mace's 
proposal includes a fee-shifting provision for civil damages 
that would, you know, it is found to be indeed nonconsensual, 
deepfake pornography, that the perpetrator would have to pay. 
But still, even Taylor Swift still has the problem of those 
images and videos are still out there, and even she cannot----
    Mr. Timmons. Well, it also goes back to the provenance. 
Like, how do you know who did it? Anyways, OK. I am over. Thank 
you. I yield back.
    Ms. Mace. Thank you, and I will recognize Ms. Pressley for 
5 minutes.
    Ms. Pressley. Thank you to our witnesses for being here 
today, including Ms. Mani. As a survivor of intra-family 
childhood sexual abuse myself, I must say, I really do look 
forward to a day where families and children do not have to 
weaponize and relive their trauma in order to compel action 
from their government, but I am grateful for those who do it 
time and time again.
    Frederick Douglass once said it is easier to build strong 
children than to repair broken men and women. That is why in 
the 116th Congress, as a freshman Member and serving on the 
Oversight Committee, I convened the first-ever hearing on 
childhood trauma in the history of this Committee. Children 
across the country and in my district, the Massachusetts 7th, 
are facing layered crises, shouldering unprecedented emotional 
burden from challenges in their homes, classrooms, and now, 
more than ever, online. Our young girls--our young girls, and 
we must see them as all of our children--our girls are targeted 
and victimized the most.
    Just last year, the CDC released a report that teenage 
girls are experiencing record-high levels of violence, sadness, 
and suicide ideation. The trauma backpacks that they carry 
across the thresholds into our schools every day only grow 
heavier. I ask unanimous consent to enter this youth risk 
behavior survey into the record.
    Ms. Mace. Without objection.
    Ms. Pressley. You know, as a Black woman who was once a 
Black young girl, I know intimately what it is for your body to 
be criminalized, your hair to be criminalized, for your body to 
be banned, objectified, and, as a survivor, violated. And as 
this report makes plain and this hearing has confirmed, our 
girls are being traumatized. I worry for my 15-year-old 
daughter, who will think that it is normal, a conflated part of 
her identity as a girl or a woman in this country, to 
experience these indignities and these violations. Professor 
Waldman, in what ways does nonconsensual, deepfake pornography 
contribute to the growing crises of childhood trauma?
    Dr. Waldman. I need more than 2 1/2 minutes to describe all 
those ways, but very briefly, the nonconsensual, deepfake 
pornography does more than just nonconsensual pornography in 
that not only does it objectify and make someone at risk of, 
you know, someone who is always looking over their shoulder, 
every image, every social encounter that they engage in, which 
deters them from engaging with other people, which is necessary 
at any age of life, but also, it allows for this to happen even 
if you do not have any images out there, right, because these 
images can be created even with a simple instruction to an AI 
generator. Essentially, what it does is it creates perpetual 
trauma and perpetual risk of trauma.
    Ms. Pressley. That is right. Thank you. And further, a 
traumatized child certainly has a decreased readiness to learn. 
Advances in AI have made it easier for people to create sexual 
content that intimidates, degrades, dehumanizes, and 
traumatizes victims, and this technology is becoming more 
present in our K through 12 schools. Ms. Mani, can you describe 
what the psychological damage is for teenagers who are victims 
of this type of harassment? And once again, thank you for the 
courage you and your daughter continue to display in the face 
of these reprehensible acts.
    Ms. Mani. [Off mic.]
    Ms. Mace. Turn your microphone on or speak into it.
    Ms. Mani. So, I am not trained to really talk about the 
repercussions of those images. All I can tell you is that we 
are not the majority. We took a stand and my daughter took back 
her dignity, but not many girls can be in the same position 
because of multiple of layers and factors. Most importantly, it 
is a shame that in 2024, we are still talking about consent, 
consent in regards to our body. Now that should be taught as a 
sentence, and our girls that are not empowered but rather 
falling through the cracks because of the educational system. 
Laws, they have to be put in place? Hundred percent. School 
policies? Hundred percent. And then we all should sit down and 
figure out ways of how to make it better without pointing 
fingers as well but, rather, because it is ethical and the 
right thing to do.
    Ms. Pressley. Absolutely. I think we should start with 
trauma-informed schools. Thank you.
    Ms. Mani. Hundred percent.
    Ms. Mace. I will now recognize Mr. Langworthy for 5 
minutes.
    Mr. Langworthy. Thank you, Chairwoman Mace. It seems now 
every single week that goes by, we see another story about a 
bad actor using AI unethically. And while I strongly support 
innovation and will always work to make sure that this country 
does not lose its edge to China in the AI race, I think that we 
all must hold accountable unethical creators, criminal actors, 
and especially those who are creating child pornography and 
child sexual abuse material.
    Emerging technology should always be used in ethical ways, 
and tech companies, alongside Congress, need to ensure that 
this happens. That is why I am very proud to be working on 
legislation with attorney generals [sic] from all 50 states and 
four territories that would create a commission examining 
generative AI safeguards, assess current statutes, and 
recommend legislative revisions to enhance law enforcement's 
ability to prosecute AI-related child exploitation crimes.
    And I would like to enter into the record a letter signed 
by 54 attorneys general calling for this commission-based 
approach.
    Ms. Mace. Without objection.
    Mr. Langworthy. I want to start today by talking about law 
enforcement's approach to generative AI. Mr. Shehan, how is law 
enforcement reacting to the uptick in AI-generated child sexual 
abuse material, CSAM? Has that approach been reactive as in 
waiting for images to circulate, or are there ways law 
enforcement can be more proactive?
    Mr. Shehan. Excellent question. In a lot of the scenarios, 
these are reactive because I outlined earlier that many of the 
generative AI technology companies, they are not taking 
proactive measures to identify and stop the creation of that 
material on the onset. It is often after the content has 
already made its way into the wild that you have social media 
companies and the such that are finding these types of material 
and reporting it into our CyberTipline, and we, in turn, 
provide that information to the Internet Crimes Against 
Children Task Force members who are actively investigating 
these cases.
    One quick example, in the fourth quarter of last year, we 
had a report that came through--it was made by Facebook--
regarding an adult male who was talking through Messenger to a 
minor using Stable Diffusion to create child sexual abuse 
content. Sent it to the minor. It was detected and reported. 
The Wisconsin ICAC investigated that case, found out not only 
was he creating content, possessed child sexual abuse material, 
and through the forensic interviews, also realized he was 
abusing his 5-year-old son. State and local law enforcement are 
having to deal with these issues because the technology 
companies are not taking the steps on the front end to build 
these tools with Safety By Design. We are getting this content 
out into the wild far too early, and something has to be done 
about this.
    Mr. Langworthy. It is chilling. Thank you. I would like to 
point out that the sheer volume of cyber tips has oftentimes 
prevented law enforcement from pursuing proactive investigation 
efforts that would efficiently target the most egregious 
offenders. In only a 3-month period from November 1, 2022 to 
February 1, 2023, there were over 99,000 IP addresses 
throughout the United States that distributed known CSAM, and 
only 782 were investigated. Currently, law enforcement, through 
no fault of their own, they just do not have the ability to 
investigate and prosecute the overwhelming number of these 
cases.
    Mr. Szabo, there have been several bills introduced this 
Congress to address the current legal framework to protect 
those exploited by generative AI, and even more that look to 
combat deepfakes all at once. You know, while many of them are 
well intentioned, my concern is that the Department of Justice 
has not had much success in prosecuting a number of these cases 
because of the fine line that needs to be walked with the First 
Amendment rights. So, I wanted to ask you, what are the biggest 
gaps in the current legal framework that need to be filled?
    Mr. Szabo. So, there is a case called Ashcroft v. Freedom 
of Speech Coalition, and basically what it got into is an 
overly broad law, well intentioned, to prohibit these types of 
activities, but it applied to non-actual victims of fake 
images, and the U.S. Supreme Court shot that down. They said it 
is a violation of the First Amendment. So, one of the gaps is 
the type of legislation that we have been talking about here, 
whether it is the Chairwoman's legislation as well as some of 
the other bills that have been proposed from all sides of the 
aisle, to kind of fill that gap and make crystal clear that AI-
created content, if it has the image of an actual or 
identifiable child, is CSAM material, as opposed to the way the 
laws are currently written, which requires an actual photo. So, 
we are seeing time and time again that bad actors are escaping 
justice. At the same time, the Invest in Child Safety Act, I 
think, is a really important one to give law enforcement the 
tools it needs.
    One other thing to address is groups like NCMEC are taking 
on tons of information but not necessarily having enough time 
to process it, and they have a mandatory deletion time for 
content. So, giving them a bit more time to process and 
prosecute content that they receive and tips that they receive, 
I think would be helpful as well.
    Mr. Langworthy. Thank you very much, and I am out of time. 
Thank you, Chairwoman, for having this hearing, and I yield 
back.
    Ms. Mace. Thank you. I will now recognize Mr. Garcia for 5 
minutes.
    Mr. Garcia. Thank you very much, Madam Chair, and thank you 
for allowing me to waive on to the Committee today. I want to 
thank all of our witnesses, particularly to Ms. Mani. My heart 
goes out to you and everything that obviously you have 
experienced. I also want to just note a couple other cases I 
think are important.
    A few weeks ago, fake images were circling online that put 
real students' faces on artificially generated nude bodies from 
Beverly Vista Middle School in Beverly Hills. We are talking 
about middle school students. We know that that is completely 
predatory and unacceptable. I know a lot of examples have been 
discussed today. Also, just weeks ago, AI-generated 
pornographic deepfake images of Taylor Swift were viewed more 
than 45 million times.
    Now, media investigations showed how easy it was to get AI 
software guardrails to post these images and how platforms 
struggled to prevent people from sharing them.
    Ms. Mace. Will the gentleman yield for 1 second? We need to 
waive you on. I ask unanimous consent to have Representative 
Garcia from California on the Subcommittee for today's hearing, 
and without objection so ordered.
    Mr. Garcia. Thank you. Now, I would like to ask unanimous 
consent to introduce this article entitled, ``The Taylor Swift 
Deepfake Debacle Was Preventable,'' and these are all really 
serious issues.
    Now, fortunately, someone like Taylor Swift had millions of 
fans that came out to defend her, to protect her online. They 
flooded social media with junk posts to bury abusive content. 
The phrase, ``Protect Taylor Swift,'' was on 36,000 posts that 
were shared. But we know that Taylor Swift fans and Swifties 
cannot protect everyone and certainly not people that do not 
have that platform, and so Congress has a responsibility to 
act.
    Now, deepfake pornography accounts for 98 percent of 
deepfake videos online, and 99 percent of all deepfake porn 
features women, while only 1 percent feature men. A 2019 study 
found that 96 percent of all deepfake videos were nonconsensual 
pornography, and it does not matter, of course, whether you are 
a billionaire, one of the most powerful women on earth, whether 
you are Taylor Swift, or a middle school student, deepfake 
pornography and the manipulation of images is deeply troubling 
and predatory, particularly to women across this country and 
girls.
    Now, we know that deepfake images can also be used to 
intimidate, harass, and victimize people, and oftentimes, if 
you are targeted, there is nowhere to turn, and, Ms. Mani, I 
know in your situation you received little to no support. And I 
just wanted to ask you, did you feel you got any support from 
the actual school itself?
    Ms. Mani. I received zero support, and it is disappointing 
that I have to sit down in here, and, you know, fighting for 
the girls of Westfield and other girls of United States because 
my school did not have the balls to do so. Also, in contrast, 
as you mentioned, the Beverly Hills incident, that principal or 
superintendent, you know, withdrew the boys from the school, 
completed HIB investigation within 10 days. He did the right 
thing. Was it an easy choice? No, but it was the right thing, 
and I think our girls should not be solo gladiators fighting 
for their rights. It is shameful that in 2024, we need to fight 
still for our rights.
    Mr. Garcia. That is exactly right, and I want to note that 
the Beverly Hills middle school case, I mean, students were 
actually expelled in that that case.
    Ms. Mani. Correct.
    Mr. Garcia. The principal acted quickly.
    Ms. Mani. That is right.
    Mr. Garcia. And it is important to note, I mean, all young 
girls deserve equal protection. That also happens to be a 
school that is very well resourced with parents that are 
constantly advocating. It is in Beverly Hills, and so it should 
not matter where the school is or the resources parents may 
have, but every girl deserves protection at every single school 
or any student, period.
    Also, just, Professor Waldman, we know, also, just briefly, 
with the remainder of my time, we know that Russia and China 
and other hostile actors are targeting our elections. We have 
seen deepfakes already used to do that, whether it is targeting 
President Biden or other elections that are happening as well. 
Can you explain how what is happening right now is undermining 
our election security and as well as our national security?
    Dr. Waldman. Sure. So, I think it can boil down to what 
deepfakes do is, as I said during my testimony, they create a 
liar's dividend, which means that when anything could be false, 
then everything is presumed to be false. Therefore, when we 
know that AI can be used by Russia and hostile countries to 
undermine our democracy, then we start disbelieving everything, 
right? We do not start just disbelieving the things that are 
actually false. We start then allowing people to say, well, how 
do I know that it is true? It could be a deepfake. And when we 
disagree on even just the basic things, democracy ceases to 
work.
    Mr. Garcia. And I appreciate that. I think obviously, 
deepfakes are oftentimes being used for entertainment purposes. 
I mean, look, I have seen deepfakes on funny videos, on things 
that could be entertaining, but it is also deeply troubling 
when it affects our elections and certainly when it is 
affecting people and young people in our country.
    Before I close, I just want to introduce a written 
statement into the record from Dr. Mary Anne Franks. Dr. Franks 
is the President and Legislative Tech Policy Director of the 
Cyber Civil Rights Institute and Eugene L. and Barbara A. 
Bernard Professor of Intellectual Property, Technology, and 
Civil Rights at George Washington Law. So, I would like to 
just----
    Ms. Mace. Without objection, so ordered.
    Mr. Garcia. Thank you, and thank you all to our witnesses.
    Ms. Mace. Right. I will now recognize Mrs. Luna for 5 
minutes.
    Mrs. Luna. Chairwoman, if I could submit this poster into 
the record.
    Ms. Mace. Without objection, so ordered.
    Mrs. Luna. So, there has been a lot of talk today on CSAM, 
but for those who might be tuning in that might not know what 
that is, it is the creation of child sexual abuse materials 
from lifelike images of children. This situation has not only 
perpetuated the occurrence of child sexual exploitation in this 
country, but has also created a new legal question about how to 
effectively crack down on the practice to protect our children. 
And I bring this up because this was actually something that 
the FBI, in talking to them about cybercrimes, asked us to 
specifically look at because they are having issues currently 
prosecuting these really, really gross, sick individuals 
because, technically, a child is not hurt in the process 
because it is a generated image.
    According to recent reports, thousands of AI-generated 
child sex images have been found on forums across the dark web. 
Some of these forums have even been found to have instructions 
that detail how other pedophiles can create their own AI-
generated sex images, and I just want to point to the poster 
behind me.
    [Chart]
    Mrs. Luna. If you see ``after COVID in 2020,'' and then you 
see this spike, this also, in my opinion, correlates with the 
rise and the, I think, evolution of AI getting better and 
better and better at generating these graphics and images, and 
you can see it is clearly not good for our kids. This has 
increased the speed and scale at which pedophiles create new 
CSAM. One report explained that in the creation of new images, 
pedophiles superimpose the face of children onto adult bodies 
using deepfakes and rapidly generate many images through one 
single command.
    The importance of raising awareness of this problem speaks 
for itself. In one study of an online forum with over 3,000 
members, over 80 percent of respondents stated that they would 
use or intended to use AI to create child sexual abuse images. 
This is concerning for child safety and makes law enforcement 
efforts to find victims and combat real world abuse much, much 
more important.
    My first question is for Mr. John Shehan. You previously 
stated in a report of CSAM, online platforms grew from 32 
million in 2022 to 36 million in 2023. What factors do you 
think have contributed to this trend?
    Mr. Shehan. That is an excellent question, and much of it 
is around just the global scale and ability to create and 
disseminate child sexual abuse material. This is truly a global 
issue. The 36 million reports last year, more than 90 percent 
were outside the United States, individuals using U.S. servers, 
but we are also seeing a massive increase in the number of 
reports that we are receiving regarding the enticement of 
children for sexual acts.
    In your chart there, you know, in 2021, we had about 80,000 
reports regarding the online enticement of children. Last year, 
it jumped up to 180,000 reports. Not even through the first 
quarter of this year, we are already over 100,000 reports 
regarding the enticement of children. Many of these cases are 
involving generative AI. Others are financial sextortion. So, 
there are individuals in countries like Nigeria and the Ivory 
Coast, and it is all about the money. They are blackmailing 
young boys to create a sexually explicit image, just that one 
image, and then they are after the money----
    Mrs. Luna. The deepfakes.
    Mr. Shehan [continuing]. Significant amounts of money.
    Mrs. Luna. Just out of curiosity, because we have 
legislation. I know that I am cosponsoring Representative 
Mace's legislation in regard to deepfakes, but in regard to the 
No. 1 platform that you are finding that this is being 
circulated on, and I know that this has been a question of how 
do these online platforms moderate this content, what is the 
No. 1 platform that you are finding that is distributing this?
    Mr. Shehan. Well, so GAI and deepfakes, it is a difficult 
question because some of the companies that are reporting the 
most are doing the most. I mentioned earlier OpenAI. They are 
setting the bar for what every single other generative AI 
company should be doing in this space. I also gave an example 
just a minute ago about Stable Diffusion, which is owned by 
Stability AI. They are not even registered to report to the 
CyberTipline. So, we have a huge gap in some of these providers 
who are enabling individuals to create child sexual abuse 
content, and they are not even set up to report. So, it is 
difficult to give a top provider when there are so many that 
are not even doing a bare minimum.
    Mrs. Luna. So, what would you say the bare minimums are?
    Mr. Shehan. Well, certainly taking proactive steps that, if 
someone is trying to use these tools to create child sexual 
abuse material or modify it or text prompts to create, they 
should not be allowing that to happen. We started off this 
session, Ranking Member Connolly had mentioned the Stanford 
Internet Observatory research that was done that discovered 
that there was child sexual abuse material in the training set 
of these data that was given to the OpenAI models to train on. 
How did that even happen?
    Mrs. Luna. Yes.
    Mr. Shehan. How is their child sexual abuse material in the 
content that they are training on? So, there are so many things 
that we work backward on to rectify the situation that we are 
in right now.
    Mrs. Luna. OK. Well, I know parents might be tuning in, so 
I just ask you, and I am sure you would agree, but maybe not 
post pictures of your children on the web because right now, it 
is kind of the Wild West out there, and they could be 
exploited.
    Mr. Shehan. There certainly are situations where even the 
benign photos, the clothed photos, as you heard earlier, are 
being used, run through these tools, and turned into nudity and 
pornographic content. So, it is a troubling time to be posting 
content online with some of these tools that are not built 
Safety By Design.
    Mrs. Luna. Thank you for your time. Chairwoman, I yield my 
time.
    Ms. Mace. OK. We will now, finally, Mr. Morelle, recognize 
you, and thank you for being here this afternoon. Thank you for 
waiting so patiently.
    Mr. Morelle. Thank you, Madam Chair, and let me start by 
thanking you for holding this incredibly important hearing. And 
thank Ranking Member Connolly and both of you for allowing me 
to participate in this conversation, as well as thanking our 
witnesses for sharing their perspectives on this fast-growing 
and very, very dangerous issue, an issue that has been noted 
overwhelmingly, disproportionately affects women.
    And I also want to acknowledge some familiar faces on the 
witness panel. I, first of all, want to thank Dorata Mani, a 
mother, powerful advocate and partner in the war to help 
prevent innocent people from being harmed by nonconsensual 
deepfake images. I have had the pleasure of meeting both Dorata 
and her 14-year-old daughter, Francesca, several times, 
including here in Washington, where they both courageously 
participated in a conversation with myself and Congressman Tom 
Kean on this topic.
    I also want to thank the Cyber Civil Rights Initiative, 
represented here by Dr. Waldman, for their assistance in the 
drafting of my legislation, the Preventing Deepfakes of 
Intimate Images Act, which was originally introduced in 2022, 
long before anyone heard of what happened to Taylor Swift, and 
we reintroduced the bill in May 2023. On this Subcommittee 
alone, Members Connolly, Lynch, Langworthy, and Moskowitz are 
cosponsors.
    And as I listen and learn from our witnesses panel this 
afternoon, the need has been clearly demonstrated for a 
comprehensive, and what I hope will be a bipartisan, solution 
to address the unique pain caused by the distribution of 
nonconsensual, intimate deepfake images, and as has been said, 
and I think bears repeating, made so much easier today by 
advances in both generative AI as well as hardware and the 
capability of even laptops to be able to do this. You know, 
years ago, you would need to have some sophistication. 
Nowadays, frankly, I think teenagers will be able to do it with 
very little training and very little time and energy.
    I agree with much of what has been said by my colleagues. 
Over 50 Members have already supported my legislation, which 
will make sharing these images - it is comprehensive in the 
sense that it creates sharing of the images a criminal offense 
and also creates a private right of action for victims to seek 
relief. And I hope others, not only on the Subcommittee, but 
other Members will consider joining as well as we look to 
perhaps work on all these different proposals and blend them 
together.
    Having said that, in just a couple of minutes, I want to 
start with a question for you, Mrs. Mani, and thank you, again, 
for sharing your story and for your thoughtful notes and 
commentary on a comprehensive solution. And throughout your 
testimony and other comments you have made publicly, you called 
attention to the work that needs to be done at the local and 
state level, within our education system particularly, and also 
focusing on artificial intelligence companies and what they 
need to do and their responsibilities. So, based on your 
experience discussing your story and what you have learned, how 
do you think Congress can help ensure that these entities are 
better prepared to combat the issue of nonconsensual deepfake 
pornography?
    Ms. Mani. I actually think we should establish a roundtable 
without pointing fingers and ask them for solutions. They are 
the experts. They will teach us more than we can ever know. So, 
that is one. No. 2, create a coalition of companies, platforms 
that host the illegal content, like Google, Amazon, and few 
others, as well as the financial platforms that facilitate 
spread of that content, like Amex, Google, Visa, PayPal, et 
cetera, et cetera, to come to the table because it is the right 
thing to do.
    You know, I have watched, just like every one of us 
watched, the Senate hearing, and every single platform said the 
same thing that you said today. We are fathers and we are 
mothers, and I think that is what we need to do. We need to sit 
down and figure out ways how to fix it without laws and 
legislations. Put laws and legislations in place, and then put 
accountability on the perpetrators or the bad actors.
    Mr. Morelle. Thank you. If I could ask you, Dr. Waldman, in 
the few seconds I have left, could you talk about the 
importance of a multipronged approach, civil and criminal, in 
whatever it is we ultimately decide to do here?
    Dr. Waldman. Sure. I think a civil remedy approach is a 
step forward but insufficient for a couple of reasons. We 
cannot be sure that a simple threat of civil damages would be 
enough because so many of the perpetrators of this are, you 
know, the dude in the basement who is probably judgment proof, 
and so you will not be made whole by a civil remedy. Relying on 
a civil remedy alone puts the burden entirely on the victim, 
right, and civil litigation is really expensive, so when you 
are not Taylor Swift, as we said before, it is really hard to 
even start something like that. And then in certain situations, 
we have a history of under criminalizing bad things that happen 
to women, and intersectionally marginalized women, in 
particular.
    So, while I think we need to be concerned about people in 
power misusing their power in certain situations, we want to 
make sure we criminalize this kind of behavior in other 
instances for important reasons, because it is so bad, because 
we need that deterrent effect. And I fear that without this 
comprehensive approach, including government organizations like 
CISA getting involved in helping platforms do what they should 
be doing on this, then we are going to leave victims without 
any recourse.
    Mr. Morelle. Thank you, Madam Chair, for your indulgence, 
and thanks for allowing me the opportunity to participate. I 
yield back.
    Ms. Mace. Of course. Thank you. In closing, I want to thank 
our panelists once again for their testimony today, and I want 
to encourage you all, please stay in touch with this Committee, 
but with my office. I am deeply passionate about this issue. I 
come from a background in technology. When I got my first job, 
I was a programmer, and I have since been fighting for things, 
especially for women and kids, and this is a very important 
issue. I have seen this kind of thing have devastating 
consequences, even deadly consequences, when we are talking 
about nonconsensual pornography.
    I want to piggyback on what Dr. Walden just talked about, 
civil damages not being enough. You are right. Any victim who 
is a victim of a nonconsensual image or video, real or 
deepfake, should know, should be able to take possession of 
that and know that it is never going to be seen anywhere ever 
again for the rest of their life, if that is what they want. 
But that is not really a thing today, I mean, because these 
things can be found online and everywhere. Once that is out, it 
is forever. And these victims should be allowed to get their 
content back, real or fake, if their image and their likeness 
is part of it, and know that it has been destroyed forever, 
from every device, any cloud, anywhere online.
    And we are not there yet, and it is deeply troubling. So, 
civil damages are not enough, and in some cases, I mean, there 
is not even criminal action here. I mean, I look at the 
Violence Against Women Act, and it is just a civil right of 
action, not even criminal. I think if you are doing voyeurism 
at the Federal level, you got to be, like, over international 
water for it to be against Federal law under Title 18. Like, it 
is insane to me. And so, I am deeply passionate about trying to 
correct some of this, correct course, find the gaps, like, as 
you said, Mr. Szabo, on definitions. While we were sitting here 
today, I went into the South Carolina's Code of Laws, and I 
just looked up the word ``porn.'' It does not exist in South 
Carolina's Code of Law. So, when we are talking about 
definitions, I agree with you, there is room for improvement, 
there are gaps here, and I really want to figure out how we 
move forward in a bipartisan manner at the Federal level, but 
also with states.
    Especially in my home state of South Carolina, there is a 
lot of work to do. Five hundred fine for voyeurism, the first 
time is a misdemeanor is wrong, and it is offensive, and it 
should be much more expensive. We want to make sure that a man 
who does that to over a dozen women in South Carolina does not 
ever do it again, and a $500 fine and 3 years in jail just does 
not cut it. And the law is not clear on whether or not, if it 
is the first offense or if, let us say, for example, an example 
that I shared, if it is over a dozen women, images and videos 
this individual took, if it would be a felony because it is 
multiple victims. The law is not clear. So, there certainly is, 
you know, definitely room for improvement in our state as well. 
And I looked up impersonations, forgery. Forgery in South 
Carolina law is only related to financial transactions, mostly.
    So, there is just so much room to improve here, both at the 
Federal and the state level. I want you all to know that my 
office is very much keen on adding to our portfolio of 
legislation, constitutionally, as it makes sense, not overdoing 
it, but just the right amount so that victims are no longer 
victimized, or when they are, that it is quickly corrected.
    So, with that and without objection, all Members will have 
5 legislative days within which to submit materials and to 
submit additional written questions for the witnesses, which 
will be forwarded to the witnesses for their response.
    Ms. Mace. So, if there is no further business, without 
objection, the Subcommittee stands adjourned, and thank you.
    [Whereupon, at 3:53 p.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.]

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