India Takes Steps to Combat Deepfakes, Strengthening Legal and Technical Frameworks

Union Minister of State for Electronics and Information Technology Jitin Prasada informed the Lok Sabha that the government is taking serious note of the growing threats associated with deepfakes. Deepfakes include not just fake videos, but also AI-generated audio, images and written content. To prevent these, legal and technical frameworks have been strengthened under the Information Technology Act, the Indian Penal Code, and the Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021. Advertisement AI-generated content will have to be clearly labelled and identifiable metadata. Platforms will have to ensure that people can easily identify that content is AI-generated. Technical measures will have to be taken to prevent the creation, publication and dissemination of non-legal AI content. Impersonation and misleading AI content will have to be identified and removed immediately. Non-consensual intimate images or videos will have to be dealt with immediately. Platforms will have to ensure due diligence and compliance with the law, and other social media platforms will have to implement technical measures to identify harmful AI or AI-generated content.