5 ms·

I assume the answer to that will be that there is no need to differentiate between them. And honestly, I agree with that argument. Possession of CSAM should be

I assume the answer to that will be that there is no need to differentiate between them. And honestly, I agree with that argument. Possession of CSAM should be illegal regardless of whether it's "real" or not. But the proposed scanning system is the wrong solution, regardless of any "real or AI" ambiguity, because it's possible to generate false positives with nonsense images that aren't even close to the expected CSAM, real or otherwise.

whimsicalism 3y ago
I am of the opinion that regardless of whether they are both illegal, the penalties for “AI” should be significantly less.
- anononaut 3y ago
  What's your reasoning?
postalrat 3y ago
Seems like you want to bring all the success of the war on drugs to the war on generated images.
- chatmasta 3y ago
  No, I don't support any automated scanning system or really any sort of "going out of our way" to find new criminals. The reason I think it's a bad idea to differentiate between real or AI is similar to the arguments against "means testing" for distributing benefits. You don't want to put real victims in a situation where they're deprived of justice because they can't prove that their victimization was "real." Imagine a real CSAM criminal claiming a defense that they "thought it was AI generated." Do you want to give them that out? If protecting those victims comes at a cost of punishing criminals possessing AI-generated CSAM with sentences equally as harsh as those for "real" CSAM, then it's a worthwhile cost to pay. They are still criminals, and they are definitely not innocent (unless they're being framed, but that's a risk with both real and AI images).
  - Hizonner 3y ago
    It's already a strict liability offense in many places, meaning that you don't even have to know that you possessed the image at all. You could apply the same strict liability standard and say that it doesn't matter that you didn't think it was real as long as it actually was real. "I thought she was 18" doesn't work for physical sex either.
    - chatmasta 3y ago
      This is the only reasonable comment in the entire thread. Make CP possession a matter of strict liability and all problems are solved.
  - gambiting 3y ago
    >> Imagine a real CSAM criminal claiming a defense that they "thought it was AI generated." Saying "I thought this heroin was fake" is not a defense when caught with a bag of heroin, I don't see how this would be any different. It's not a magic out for anyone.
    - LorenPechtel 3y ago
      Sure it is. The bag of "heroin" on the movie set turns out to be real, think the actors are going to be convicted of possession?
      - gambiting 3y ago
        I'm not sure what is the point that you are making here. An actor who was given a fake bag of heroin as a prop which then turns out to be real is no more guilty than a courier moving a package that happens to contain drugs or guns or fake money or anything else - neither would be found guilty of posession. These are situational circumstances, and no prosecutor in the world would choose to prosecute those - but there is 0% chance you could get away with saying "oh I thought it was fake" if caught with CP on your phone.
        3y ago
epups 3y ago
> I assume the answer to that will be that there is no need to differentiate between them. And honestly, I agree with that argument. Why do you believe that?
- chatmasta 3y ago
  See my comment to a sibling reply. Basically I don't want to make victims prove their victimization was real, and I don't want to give criminals with real victims an opportunity to argue they "thought it was AI generated."
  - usrnm 3y ago
    And I absolutely want both parties to have to prove crime/innocence and have an opportunity to argue. The current situation, where anything involving CSAM is so toxic that lives are ruined without trial is not healthy and isn't good for anybody
    - Hizonner 3y ago
      Point of order: victims are not "parties" in criminal cases, not in remotely modern legal systems. The parties are the accused and the state. For the same reason, victims don't get to pardon crimes committed against them. ... which is the way it should be, because criminal punishment should not be seen as a form of revenge, but as a deterrent.
      - qingcharles 3y ago
        Right. Most crimes are essentially ones that "the people" found unsavory. For instance, there is no "victim" if I got caught enjoying cannabis in my own home in a jurisdiction where such a thing is illegal, but "the people" have made a decision that they don't like it and I should be punished for committing an anti-social act. That is one of the fundamental aspects of democracy at work.
sneak 3y ago
> Possession of CSAM should be illegal regardless of whether it's "real" or not. From a purely ethical standpoint: why? What is the purpose of punishing someone who has harmed no one? No victim means no crime.
- chatmasta 3y ago
  From a purely ethical standpoint, sure, I agree. But we live in reality, and there are plenty of activities that seem ethically victimless, but are practically necessary to criminalize, in order to uphold societal frameworks and expectations of morality. In this case, by giving every CSAM criminal a potential excuse that they "thought it was AI generated," the real victims are further victimized by being deprived of justice or forced to prove their realness.
  - dragonwriter 3y ago
    Broadening the definitions of crime to make it easier to punish the ethically guilty on scant evidence while incidentally sweeping up the ethically innocent is a hack around a legal tradition that is designed exactly on the principal that it is better that the guilty go unpunished than the innocent are punished, by making the genuinely innocent administratively guilty, and we ought to reject that kind of justification every time it rears its head. (There are times when it is important to have commonality while the choice of the common practice isn't important, which justifies regulations of obviously ethically unimportant things like "which side of the road is it correct to drive on relative to the direction of travel"; but where the purpose of a crime is purely to lower the evidentiary bar to punish people presumed guilty of a narrower crime, that's just an attempt to hack around the presumption of innocence and the burden of proof of guilt.)
    - chatmasta 3y ago
      I agree with you. I think our disagreement here is over the level of innocence of someone possessing AI generated CSAM. If you believe, as I do, that such a person is guilty of a crime, then we're not risking the false guiltiness of an innocent person. At best, we're risking their level of sentencing. And I'm open to the idea of reduced sentences for AI CSAM, but it shouldn't be a factor in determination of guilt (i.e. it should be a matter between the judge and the defendant, rather than something the prosecution needs to prove). With regards to CSAM criminalization in general, there is a real risk of punishing innocent people that may have been framed by planted evidence. But this is a risk regardless of whether the evidence is "real" CSAM or not, so legalizing possession of AI-generated CSAM doesn't reduce the risk of an innocent person being framed. It might make it "easier" for a bad actor to frame someone, since they can now do it with AI content instead of real content. But if they're already planting evidence, do they really care whether they're committing a crime while preparing the evidence? And besides, if we keep the AI content illegal, then it's equally legally risky to frame someone with it as it is to frame them with real content. The problem of prosecuting "innocent" people, whether you believe they're innocent because they were framed or because they're only guilty of possessing AI-generated CSAM, should be addressed at the time of enforcement. Stop using entrapment and fishing expeditions as an enforcement mechanism. Only open investigations when they start with a real and identifiable victim, rather than a potential perpetrator.
londons_explore 3y ago
> I assume the answer to that will be that there is no need to differentiate between them. And honestly, I agree with that I disagree. The point is to reduce actual child abuse. The images are in a way only tangential. If an image is made with an AI with no actual child being abused, then it shouldn't be a crime. In a way, it's better, because it will distract the crowd of people into this sort of stuff from activities that harm real people.
- dragonwriter 3y ago
  > because it will distract the crowd of people into this sort of stuff from activities that harm real people. This is actually the main point in dispute, and almost everyone arguing one side or the other on this topic seems to assume one side or the other on this point and argue from there, rather than seeking to support their position on the fundamental disputed fact question. Which results in the most of the debate being people talking past each other based on conflicting assumptions of fact.
  - Y_Y 3y ago
    This feels a bit like "cold reading", I think you're absolutely right, but for all I know you could have been intending to post that comment on half the other threads on the front page.
    - dragonwriter 3y ago
      Its certainly a common-enough phenomenon, what makes it specific to the topic is the specific factual disagreement relevant to this issue that people just assume a side on.
  - flkenosad 3y ago
    Exactly. It may distract a crowd of people into something less harmful. Or, it may perpetuate a behaviour sort of like the commonness of cigarettes leads to more people craving nicotine.
qingcharles 3y ago
I'm on the fence about whether AI CSAM should be illegal or not. There is no scientific consensus either way on whether it increases or decreases a person's thoughts about actual physical abuse. The issue is that the people (and the legislators) in each jurisdiction have made a choice that AI CSAM is not illegal, and therefore this runs the risk of falsely accusing someone of a crime. [if you disagree that AI CSAM should be legal in your jurisdiction the solution isn't to arrest everyone, but to petition your lawmakers to change the law]

whimsicalism 3y ago

I am of the opinion that regardless of whether they are both illegal, the penalties for “AI” should be significantly less.

anononaut 3y ago
What's your reasoning?

postalrat 3y ago

Seems like you want to bring all the success of the war on drugs to the war on generated images.

chatmasta 3y ago
No, I don't support any automated scanning system or really any sort of "going out of our way" to find new criminals. The reason I think it's a bad idea to differentiate between real or AI is similar to the arguments against "means testing" for distributing benefits. You don't want to put real victims in a situation where they're deprived of justice because they can't prove that their victimization was "real." Imagine a real CSAM criminal claiming a defense that they "thought it was AI generated." Do you want to give them that out? If protecting those victims comes at a cost of punishing criminals possessing AI-generated CSAM with sentences equally as harsh as those for "real" CSAM, then it's a worthwhile cost to pay. They are still criminals, and they are definitely not innocent (unless they're being framed, but that's a risk with both real and AI images).
- Hizonner 3y ago
  It's already a strict liability offense in many places, meaning that you don't even have to know that you possessed the image at all. You could apply the same strict liability standard and say that it doesn't matter that you didn't think it was real as long as it actually was real. "I thought she was 18" doesn't work for physical sex either.
  - chatmasta 3y ago
    This is the only reasonable comment in the entire thread. Make CP possession a matter of strict liability and all problems are solved.
- gambiting 3y ago
  >> Imagine a real CSAM criminal claiming a defense that they "thought it was AI generated." Saying "I thought this heroin was fake" is not a defense when caught with a bag of heroin, I don't see how this would be any different. It's not a magic out for anyone.
  - LorenPechtel 3y ago
    Sure it is. The bag of "heroin" on the movie set turns out to be real, think the actors are going to be convicted of possession?
    - gambiting 3y ago
      I'm not sure what is the point that you are making here. An actor who was given a fake bag of heroin as a prop which then turns out to be real is no more guilty than a courier moving a package that happens to contain drugs or guns or fake money or anything else - neither would be found guilty of posession. These are situational circumstances, and no prosecutor in the world would choose to prosecute those - but there is 0% chance you could get away with saying "oh I thought it was fake" if caught with CP on your phone.
      - 3y ago

epups 3y ago

> I assume the answer to that will be that there is no need to differentiate between them. And honestly, I agree with that argument. Why do you believe that?

chatmasta 3y ago
See my comment to a sibling reply. Basically I don't want to make victims prove their victimization was real, and I don't want to give criminals with real victims an opportunity to argue they "thought it was AI generated."
- usrnm 3y ago
  And I absolutely want both parties to have to prove crime/innocence and have an opportunity to argue. The current situation, where anything involving CSAM is so toxic that lives are ruined without trial is not healthy and isn't good for anybody
  - Hizonner 3y ago
    Point of order: victims are not "parties" in criminal cases, not in remotely modern legal systems. The parties are the accused and the state. For the same reason, victims don't get to pardon crimes committed against them. ... which is the way it should be, because criminal punishment should not be seen as a form of revenge, but as a deterrent.
    - qingcharles 3y ago
      Right. Most crimes are essentially ones that "the people" found unsavory. For instance, there is no "victim" if I got caught enjoying cannabis in my own home in a jurisdiction where such a thing is illegal, but "the people" have made a decision that they don't like it and I should be punished for committing an anti-social act. That is one of the fundamental aspects of democracy at work.

sneak 3y ago

> Possession of CSAM should be illegal regardless of whether it's "real" or not. From a purely ethical standpoint: why? What is the purpose of punishing someone who has harmed no one? No victim means no crime.

chatmasta 3y ago
From a purely ethical standpoint, sure, I agree. But we live in reality, and there are plenty of activities that seem ethically victimless, but are practically necessary to criminalize, in order to uphold societal frameworks and expectations of morality. In this case, by giving every CSAM criminal a potential excuse that they "thought it was AI generated," the real victims are further victimized by being deprived of justice or forced to prove their realness.
- dragonwriter 3y ago
  Broadening the definitions of crime to make it easier to punish the ethically guilty on scant evidence while incidentally sweeping up the ethically innocent is a hack around a legal tradition that is designed exactly on the principal that it is better that the guilty go unpunished than the innocent are punished, by making the genuinely innocent administratively guilty, and we ought to reject that kind of justification every time it rears its head. (There are times when it is important to have commonality while the choice of the common practice isn't important, which justifies regulations of obviously ethically unimportant things like "which side of the road is it correct to drive on relative to the direction of travel"; but where the purpose of a crime is purely to lower the evidentiary bar to punish people presumed guilty of a narrower crime, that's just an attempt to hack around the presumption of innocence and the burden of proof of guilt.)
  - chatmasta 3y ago
    I agree with you. I think our disagreement here is over the level of innocence of someone possessing AI generated CSAM. If you believe, as I do, that such a person is guilty of a crime, then we're not risking the false guiltiness of an innocent person. At best, we're risking their level of sentencing. And I'm open to the idea of reduced sentences for AI CSAM, but it shouldn't be a factor in determination of guilt (i.e. it should be a matter between the judge and the defendant, rather than something the prosecution needs to prove). With regards to CSAM criminalization in general, there is a real risk of punishing innocent people that may have been framed by planted evidence. But this is a risk regardless of whether the evidence is "real" CSAM or not, so legalizing possession of AI-generated CSAM doesn't reduce the risk of an innocent person being framed. It might make it "easier" for a bad actor to frame someone, since they can now do it with AI content instead of real content. But if they're already planting evidence, do they really care whether they're committing a crime while preparing the evidence? And besides, if we keep the AI content illegal, then it's equally legally risky to frame someone with it as it is to frame them with real content. The problem of prosecuting "innocent" people, whether you believe they're innocent because they were framed or because they're only guilty of possessing AI-generated CSAM, should be addressed at the time of enforcement. Stop using entrapment and fishing expeditions as an enforcement mechanism. Only open investigations when they start with a real and identifiable victim, rather than a potential perpetrator.

londons_explore 3y ago

> I assume the answer to that will be that there is no need to differentiate between them. And honestly, I agree with that I disagree. The point is to reduce actual child abuse. The images are in a way only tangential. If an image is made with an AI with no actual child being abused, then it shouldn't be a crime. In a way, it's better, because it will distract the crowd of people into this sort of stuff from activities that harm real people.

dragonwriter 3y ago
> because it will distract the crowd of people into this sort of stuff from activities that harm real people. This is actually the main point in dispute, and almost everyone arguing one side or the other on this topic seems to assume one side or the other on this point and argue from there, rather than seeking to support their position on the fundamental disputed fact question. Which results in the most of the debate being people talking past each other based on conflicting assumptions of fact.
- Y_Y 3y ago
  This feels a bit like "cold reading", I think you're absolutely right, but for all I know you could have been intending to post that comment on half the other threads on the front page.
  - dragonwriter 3y ago
    Its certainly a common-enough phenomenon, what makes it specific to the topic is the specific factual disagreement relevant to this issue that people just assume a side on.
- flkenosad 3y ago
  Exactly. It may distract a crowd of people into something less harmful. Or, it may perpetuate a behaviour sort of like the commonness of cigarettes leads to more people craving nicotine.

qingcharles 3y ago

I'm on the fence about whether AI CSAM should be illegal or not. There is no scientific consensus either way on whether it increases or decreases a person's thoughts about actual physical abuse. The issue is that the people (and the legislators) in each jurisdiction have made a choice that AI CSAM is not illegal, and therefore this runs the risk of falsely accusing someone of a crime. [if you disagree that AI CSAM should be legal in your jurisdiction the solution isn't to arrest everyone, but to petition your lawmakers to change the law]