Proposed changes to Coco’s Law aim to close AI ‘loophole’

By Bairbre Holmes, Press Association

A change in Coco’s Law to “close a loophole” around the generation of nonconsensual intimate images and videos using AI was debated in the Dáil on Tuesday.

Sinn Féin brought the Bill to amend current legislation to the Dáil after reports an AI chatbot on the social media site X, formerly known as Twitter, was being used to create deepfake sexualised images of people, including children.

The Harassment, Harmful Communications and Related Offences Bill, also known as Coco’s Law, was enacted in 2020.

It makes the distribution or publication of an intimate image without consent, with intent to cause harm to the victim, a serious offence with perpetrators facing up to seven years imprisonment.

It also criminalises threats to distribute or publish such images.

However, Sinn Féin’s spokesman on justice Matt Carthy said there is “ambiguity” in the current legislation, that had been “exposed” by Grok.

The party says it brought forward the amendment to “clarify that the creation of sexualised AI deepfakes is illegal”.

During the Bill’s second reading, Carthy criticised the Government saying, “they could have brought forward immediate and targeted amendment to close this loophole”.

He said: “If this was clear in law, then we wouldn’t need a minister to sit down with the companies involved.

“If you or I are suspected of breaking the law, the minister doesn’t come to our house to discuss it, the appropriate powers hold us to account.”

Maire Divine, who co-authored the amendment, said over 11 days roughly three million sexualised images were produced using Grok and said “99 per cent” of them were of women and young children.

The changes to the law would also extend the statute of limitations from two to five years, to allow victims more time to come forward.

They would give An Garda Síochána more time to forensically technically examine personal electronic devices.

And they aim to increase the maximum penalties people convicted of these crimes would face.

Minister for Justice Jim O’Callaghan said the Government would not oppose the Bill at its current stage, adding it shared the “widespread revulsion of the fact that platforms have allowed the nonconsensual nudification of images, primarily of women and children”.

He said there was a number of pieces of legislation which covered the generation or alteration of sexual images by AI.

But said he is “keen to ensure that there are no gaps in the legislation and that the current established legal framework is sufficiently robust to protect people from digital harms”.

O’Callaghan did criticise some aspects of the Sinn Féin Bill, saying the Attorney General had advised the proposed prison term of up to five years, for the creation of an image that is not shared, is a “disproportionate penalty”.