ATLANTA — In a rare show of political unity, House Republicans and Democrats joined together to pass a bill that makes creating AI-generated child porn and sexual abuse material a felony in Georgia.
Artificial intelligence is moving so rapidly that Georgia lawmakers told Channel 2’s Richard Elliot that it’s hard to keep up.
The bill makes the creation of child pornography or sexually abusive material by people using artificial intelligence a felony in the state of Georgia.
“Absolutely, one of the most heinous things I can ever think of,” Rep. Brad Thomas said.
Lawmakers say AI-generated photos often are realistic enough that they could fool people, and in the wrong hands, they could be dangerous.
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Thomas wrote the bill that not only makes those images a felony, but it also goes after other AI-generated materials too, like using AI to fake the voice of a loved one to defraud the elderly.
Those convicted could get more than a year in prison.
“I can promise you this is being perpetrated by people who take images of our children and our grandkids and they use that to train an AI model specific to create child sexual abuse material,” Thomas said.
Thomas told Elliot that he tried to get the bill passed last year, but time ran out at the end of the session.
This time, he thinks it will make it through the Senate and become law.