As corporations increasingly weave artificial intelligence technologies into the daily lives of Americans, California lawmakers want to build public trust, fight algorithmic discrimination and outlaw deepfakes that involve elections or pornography. The efforts in California — home to many of the world’s biggest AI companies — could pave the way for AI regulations across the country.
Inspired by the months-long Hollywood actors strike last year, a California lawmaker wants to protect workers from being replaced by their AI-generated clones — a major point of contention in contract negotiations. The proposal, backed by the California Labor Federation, would let performers back out of existing contracts if vague language might allow studios to freely use AI to digitally clone their voices and likeness.
Real-world risks abound as generative AI creates new content such as text, audio and photos in response to prompts. So lawmakers are considering requiring guardrails around “extremely large” AI systems that have the potential to spit out instructions for creating disasters — such as building chemical weapons or assisting in cyberattacks — that could cause at least $500 million in damages. It would require such models to have a built-in “kill switch,” among other things.
bipartisan coalition seeks to facilitate prosecuting people who use AI tools to create images of child sexual abuse. Current law does not allow district attorneys to go after people who possess or distribute AI-generated child sexual abuse images if the materials are not depicting a real person, law enforcement said.