South Korea investigates Telegram over allegations of sexual deepfake content
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Loading... - Aoi Shimizu
- 09 Sep 2024
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South Korea is intensifying its efforts to combat a rising wave of digital sex crimes involving deepfakes, following revelations of widespread abuse on the messaging platform Telegram. Authorities have launched an investigation into Telegram over allegations that it has facilitated the spread of sexually explicit deepfake content, marking the first time South Korean law enforcement has pursued the company in this manner. This investigation comes after the platform was found to be hosting numerous chat rooms where users distribute AI-generated fake sexual images and videos, often targeting ordinary women and teenage girls without their consent.
These deepfakes are created by manipulating images obtained from social media or secretly taken photographs, which are then altered using artificial intelligence. The resulting fake images are shared in Telegram chat rooms, some of which have thousands of participants. The exact number of such chat rooms and the extent of the abuse are still unclear, but many are private, accessible only by invitation, making them difficult to track.
The Korea Communications Standards Commission has reported a significant rise in requests to remove sexually abusive deepfake videos, receiving nearly 6,500 such requests in the first seven months of 2024 alone, a fourfold increase from the previous year. Police data further underscores the growing problem, with 297 cases of deepfake-related crimes reported in the first seven months of this year, compared to 180 cases in all of 2023. Alarmingly, a large proportion of both victims and perpetrators are teenagers, with 74% of suspects in recent cases aged between 10 and 19.
Telegram's founder and CEO, Pavel Durov, acknowledged the challenges in balancing privacy and security on the platform, admitting that it has become easier for criminals to misuse Telegram. Despite Telegram's efforts to remove content that violates its terms of service, the issue of sexually abusive deepfakes continues to escalate, prompting South Korean authorities to take more decisive action against the platform and those responsible for these crimes.
