The FTC is seeking public comment on changes to its impersonation rules to address growing complaints about AI-driven impersonation, the agency announced Thursday. The FTC issued a supplemental NPRM that would prohibit such impersonation. It would extend protections of a new rule on government and business impersonation the commission expected to finalize Thursday. The FTC said it issued the supplemental notice in response to “surging complaints around impersonation fraud, as well as public outcry about the harms caused to consumers and to impersonated individuals.” AI-generated deepfakes could “turbocharge this scourge, and the FTC is committed to using all of its tools to detect, deter, and halt impersonation fraud,” the agency added. The new rule allows the FTC to seek monetary relief from scammers in federal court. The public comment period will open for 60 days once the supplemental rule is published in the Federal Register. Meanwhile, New York Gov. Kathy Hochul (D) on Thursday proposed legislation that would establish new penalties for AI-created deepfakes. The bill is included in her fiscal 2025 executive budget. It would create misdemeanor charges for “unauthorized uses of a person’s voice” and establish a private right of action to seek damages for harms associated with digitally manipulated images. The bill would “require disclosures on digitized political communications published within 60 days of an election.”
Maryland this week moved one step closer to becoming the 15th state to pass comprehensive online privacy legislation by hosting debate in both chambers on Tuesday and Wednesday.
A pair of South Carolina age-verification bills will advance to the full House Judiciary Committee, which is scheduled to meet Tuesday. During a livestreamed meeting Thursday, the Constitutional Laws Subcommittee unanimously greenlit H-4700, which would require parental consent for minors younger than 18 to access social media, and H-3424, meant to keep kids off pornographic websites. The committee approved amendments to both bills by voice vote. House Judiciary Committee Chairman Weston Newton (R) revised his social media bill to be more like Louisiana’s similar law, he said. It was originally akin to a law in Utah, which faces an industry lawsuit (see 2312180054). The amended H-4700 requires social websites make commercially reasonable efforts to verify the age of South Carolina account holders and restrict anyone younger than 18 from having accounts unless they get parental consent. While tasking the state attorney general with enforcement, the amended bill continues to include a private right of action like Utah's does, said Newton. And the bill now requires online safety education for grades six through 12. Legislators should provide more support for parents and try to curb social media companies’ incentives to exploit children, said Casey Mock, Center for Humane Technology chief policy and public affairs officer. Social media companies made $11 billion in revenue from U.S. kids 18 and younger in 2022, including $2 billion from those younger than 12, said Mock, citing a Jan. 2 Harvard University study. Lawmakers should require “safety by default,” a design approach that is light touch, technology agnostic and content neutral, said Mock. Don’t be scared by tech industry "pressure tactics,” said Mock, referring to a NetChoice official mentioning litigation against other states at the South Carolina panel’s meeting last week (see 2401110044). An amendment to H-3424 tightens the definition of a pornographic website and gives sites three ways to verify age: a digitized ID card, an independent third-party verification service or “any commercially reasonable method that can verify age,” said sponsor Rep. Travis Moore (R): It also removes language directing the AG to develop rules. Wednesday in Utah, the Senate Judiciary Committee voted 4-0 to approve a bill (SB-89) delaying seven months to Oct. 1 the effective date of the state’s litigated social media law.
Kentucky state representatives and senators will consider different comprehensive data privacy bills during the 2024 legislative session, which opened Tuesday. On day one Rep. Phillip Pratt (R) introduced the 22-page HB-24, while Sen. Whitney Westerfield (R) floated SB-15, a 31-page piece of legislation. The House bill would apply to businesses that process personal data of at least 100,000 consumers annually, while the number in the Senate version is 50,000. Both bills would also apply to companies that process data of at least 25,000 consumers while deriving more than 50% of gross revenue from selling personal data. Among the differences, SB-15 would allow consumers to use global privacy controls to opt out, such as through a browser plugin or setting. Both bills allow enforcement solely by the state attorney general, with a 30-day right to cure and no private right of action. In addition, both would take effect Jan. 1, 2026. Going into 2024, 13 states had comprehensive privacy laws.
Missouri legislators introduced a flurry of telecom and internet bills before their 2024 session started Wednesday. Rep. Chad Perkins (R) pitched HB-1995 to delete the Jan. 1, 2025, sunset date for the state’s 2018 small-cells law (see 1806040050), which preempted local governments on right of way in an effort to streamline 5G infrastructure deployment. Rep. Ben Keathley (R) offered HB-2057, clarifying that streaming content is exempted from paying video franchise fees. Two other bills would relieve broadband’s tax obligations. HB-2142 by Rep. Ben Baker (R) would provide a tax deduction for broadband grant funds for 2022 and later tax years. HB-2168 by Rep. Aaron McMullen (R) would provide sales and use-tax exemptions for machinery and equipment that provides broadband, starting Jan. 1, 2025. Another Baker bill would ban Missouri government employees from using or downloading on a state-owned device "any social media application that is owned, in whole or in part, by the Chinese government or any company that shares its user’s data with the Chinese Communist Party.” HB-2141, which would cover TikTok, wouldn’t "apply to military or law enforcement agencies when doing so is in keeping with the fulfillment of their duties." Rep. Josh Hurlbert (R) seeks to ban TikTok on school district-owned devices and district-provided internet access. In addition, the bill would halt use of the specified social media application(s) to "promote any district school, school-sponsored club, extracurricular organization, or athletic team." HB-2157 would also require social media companies to verify users' ages and restrict minors from opening accounts without parental consent. Moreover, it would restrict them from using "a practice, design, or feature" that they know, or reasonably should know, "causes a Missouri minor account holder to have an addiction to the social media platform." The bill includes a private right of action and state attorney general enforcement. It would also require school districts to develop internet safety policies.