Despite Etsy's policy prohibiting pornography, a search for "deepfake porn" returned over 1,600 results as of December 18. While some of these were non-explicit services, many were explicit images of celebrities or entirely fabricated individuals. Experts argue that there is no technical reason why Etsy couldn't better filter out these materials. The company has stated that it is still determining the place of AI-generated products in its marketplace and that listings violating its policies will be removed.
Key takeaways:
- Etsy is struggling to manage a flood of AI-generated pornographic content on its site, including deepfake images of celebrities.
- Despite Etsy's policy against pornography, a search for "deepfake porn" returned over 1,600 results as of December 18, with some of these results offering non-explicit services to create deepfake videos.
- According to Hany Farid, a computer science professor at UC Berkeley, there is no technical reason that Etsy couldn't do a better job of filtering out these materials, suggesting that other ecommerce platforms like Amazon and eBay do not yield similar pornographic items.
- Rebecca Delfino, a law professor at Loyola Marymount University, noted that while there is no federal law protecting victims of deepfakes, there are some state laws, and most celebrities' lawyers would send a cease-and-desist letter to Etsy as a way of protecting their clients.