White House sounds alarm over explicit AI-generated Taylor Swift photos
Pop icon Taylor Swift is the latest victim of a disturbing trend: explicit AI-generated photos. Lately, a series of fabricated explicit images featuring the pop icon have been discovered circulating widely across various social media platforms and online spaces.
Although some of these images have been taken down due to violations of platform rules, a number of them still persist online. The singer of Cruel Summer has not yet responded to the situation. However, the fake images have prompted concern at the White House, as they raise worries about the dissemination of misinformation and the potential for harm.
AI manipulation of Taylor Swift prompts White House action
White House spokesperson Karine Jean-Pierre recently spoke to ABC News reporter Karen L. Travers. She said that Congress needs to pass laws to deal with fake explicit content made using advanced technology. Citing that the situation is highly ‘alarming’ she said, “We are alarmed by the reports of the…circulation of images that you just laid out – of false images to be more exact, and it is alarming.”
She further said that social media companies have the autonomy to make decisions about managing content, but it’s crucial for them to actively enforce their rules to prevent such harmful incidents from happening again, “While social media companies make their own independent decisions about content management, we believe they have an important role to play in enforcing their own rules to prevent the spread of misinformation, and non-consensual, intimate imagery of real people.”
Karine Jean-Pierre underlined the importance of legislative action from Congress. She also made the point that women and girls, who tragically suffer the most from online harassment and abuse, are ‘disproportionately’ impacted by insufficient enforcement online. In her closing remarks, she outlined key actions taken by the government to combat AI threats, such as establishing a task force to tackle online harassment and abuse, and the Department of Justice initiating the nation’s first 24/7 helpline for survivors of image-based sexual abuse as per ABC.
Taylor Swift deepfake AI images
A while back, the popular pop singer, often spotted at Kansas City Chiefs games to support her boyfriend Travis Kelce, became a target of a malicious AI trend. In a fabricated image produced with AI-driven generators, Swift is depicted in an inappropriate pose during a Kansas City Chiefs game. Some other images were even more malicious. AI-generated images, produced through text prompts, raise privacy concerns as they can be created without the subject’s consent.