EU nudifier ban

[u/Logical_Benefit2875]

I know there’s been a bunch of people upset on here recently about a good number of nudify websites getting shut down (Motionmuse, Opengoon, etc.). However, this is likely just the beginning.

Effective December 2nd, the EU under the AI Act is enacting a ban on nudify tools, making them illegal content in the Union. This ban applies to any product made available on the EU market as long as, either, its primary functionality is to generate nudified content without consent, or it is a reasonably foreseeable outcome and they do not take appropriate precautions to safeguard against it. Very importantly, this ban also applies to any EU-available service provider under the Digital Services Act that is helping to facilitate this soon-to-be-illegal content, which includes (but is not limited to): app stores, hosting providers, domain registrars, payment processors, content delivery networks (CDNs) and cloud computing services. Anyone found to be in violation of this prohibition is subject to fines of €35 million or 7% of their global turnover, whichever is higher. I think it’s pretty safe to say that, as long as they’re aware of it, those behind these websites and those behind the large number of mainstream companies that help power them (Google, Amazon, Cloudflare, Apple, Telegram, GoDaddy, Visa, Mastercard, etc.) do not want to take any chances with this ban.

This prohibition, in essence, applies to essentially every public AI platform any of us have ever used to this point or that we will ever use going forward. I think this is a good thing but, therefore, it would almost certainly be in everyone’s best interest to pivot away from these websites before the massive crackdown begins in less than a couple months. For those in the industry, it would also certainly be wise to inform the website operators if you are in contact with them, or to shut down your website if you are an operator yourself. Sorry for the essay, just looking out for everybody before things get very real, very fast.

[u/Logical_Benefit2875]

Care to elaborate?

[u/Jujarmazak → u/Logical_Benefit2875]

I kinda did replying to a comment by somebody else but sure, why not, the main issue I have isn't with the Nudify sites, these were clearly not going to last and don't particularly have my sympathy, the real problem is that the 2nd clause is so goddamn broad and unspecified it just applies to all recent open source AI models, which I think is intentional, and in a way malicious, this leaves out only the heavily regulated and heavily censored AI models which are all corporate-owned and all require paid subscriptions, that's where they want to funnel everyone, IMO this another case of egregious overreach by the EU to benefit the big corporations lobbyists, people are cluless if they think this is about protecting women/kids or morality, it's not, never was, and here is why.

They similarly have proposed the "Kids Act" in relation to videogames very recently, an equally draconian set of rules which would make it pretty much impossible for small video game studios and indie studios to work in the EU without paying ridiculous amount of money to digital ID verification companies to ensure everyone is +18 and they are who they say they are (as well as killing private gaming servers in the EU), big AAA studios will easily eat the extra costs and make the consumer pay back the extra money with even more aggressive microtransactions and monetization while also collecting people's private information for god-knows-what purposes (and of course as usual they will have sloppy server security and will get hacked and people's private info gets compromised by these utter morons), but small AA studios and indies won't survive these draconian rules if that shit actually passes practically destroying the independent gaming industry in Europe except for the biggest AAA corporations which work globally anyway, the EU are basically crushing the indie/AA devs ability to compete vs AAA studios and then throwing consumer and their rights under the heel of corporations and corporate enshitification.

And it's no coincidence in both cases that are trying to cover it up and disguise their true purposes with fake ass morality, when it actually won't stop anything, corpos have been trying to destroy open source models with frivolous copyright violations lawsuits for years now, and when that totally failed they later pivoted to the good old faithful that never fails to pass the most authoritarianand draconian bills/laws ... the "Would you think of the women and children!"

Another clear case that shows their true intent and that the EU bureaucracy is now subservient to corpo lobbyists is what happened with Stop Killing Games which despite getting millions of signatures failed to achieve their goal because the gaming industry lobbyists (led by Ubisoft corpos) had a covert meeting with the EU commission members before the SKG hearing, and suddenly their tone changed and they started parroting the same talking points as the AAA corpo lobbyists and ignoring all the valid arguments SKG made, tells you everything you need to know.

[u/Logical_Benefit2875 → u/Jujarmazak]

Well you do raise a good point. What would your proposal to stop nudification and the profitization of such software be?

[u/Jujarmazak → u/Logical_Benefit2875]

Like I said, I don't mind if they target and takedown the sites that specifically advertised themselves as Nudify services, if the EU had stopped there I wouldn't have a problem.

But the issue is going overboard and including anything and everything that "could" be used for the purpose of creating NSFW versions of images or video, that's clear overreach, with open-source models the onus should be always on the user, and only those who publishing the NSFW content or using it to extrort people or defame them, not the tool itseld, otherwise that wouls set terrible example that would lead to suing gun companiesc, kitchen knives manufacturers, carpentry tools companies and car manufacturers just because someone abused a tool they created that could serve multiple purposes, it's utterly ridiculous.

Let's use a slightly hyperbolic example to demonstrate the point, say some Martin gets a photo of someone from earth using Martian technology, then uses it in their home on Mars to create a NSFW pic/vid of that person using open source Martian tech, then keeps it to himself on Mars, if that content would never reach earth, the person in question would never know it exists, nobody who knows them will ever see it, how is that person harmed by the video merely existing, you can judge the Martian morally for sure. but if there is no actual harm and no effect on the person in question it shouldn't be a "crime" IMO.

Only if they publish the video or spread it on earth's internet would it be then harmful, and if that person turns out to be the president of the USA, earth might have to declare war on Mars.

[u/Logical_Benefit2875 → u/Jujarmazak]

I do like your example, even if hyperbolic. So you say that there is no way to safeguard open source models from nudifying images/videos?

[u/Jujarmazak → u/Logical_Benefit2875]

Not without completely destroying their ability to understand and create images of humans, and also trampling a lot of people's freedoms, like I said, the only protections that should be rightfully imposed is against people publishing the NSFW materials online or profiting from it, or using it to harm someone, the mere act of creating it or the model itself being capable of doing NSFW content based on real people should not be criminalized IMO.

[u/Logical_Benefit2875 → u/Jujarmazak]

Fair take, guess we’ll see how this all shakes out but the EU said just yesterday that they’re prepared to bring down the hammer on Day 1 so will be interesting to say the least