New regulation to check deepfakes coming up: Govt

New Delhi: Calling deepfake a “new threat to the society,” Union Minister for Electronics and Information Technology and Communications Ashwini Vaishnaw on Thursday said that the government will come up with new regulations to tackle the issue in 10 days.

The Minister held meetings with various stakeholders, including representatives of social media platforms, Nasscom and experts from the field of artificial intelligence (AI).

The government would come up with actionable items on four pillars -- detection of deepfakes, preventing the spread of such content, strengthening reporting mechanisms, and spreading awareness on the issue -- within 10 days, the Minister told media persons after the meeting.

Vaishnaw said the government would also look at imposing penalties on both creator and platform hosting deepfakes 

Until the regulation is made, social media platforms and companies promised to take all possible measures to prevent the spread of deepfakes. “All of them said they are taking steps internally and they would like to increase the intensity of those steps,” he said.

After drafting new regulations, the government will again convene stakeholders meeting early next month to deliberate on the issue. The government will also seek public comments for new regulation, he said.

“Deepfakes have emerged as a new threat to democracy. These (can) weaken trust in society and its institutions,” the Minister said, adding that stakeholders present at the meeting shared similar concerns regarding deepfakes, he said. “All social media platforms agreed to have extensive technology to detect deepfakes.”

Asked if there will be a change in the existing rule or new law may be brought, he said, “We can bring this in the form of making amendments to the existing rules or we can bring a new set of regulations.

“We also discussed watermarking and labelling. All agreed that we have to do this, this is the basic minimum which all will have to do,” he said.

Ever since deepfake videos targeting celebrities including actress Rashmika Mandanna went viral on social media recently, the government has been very vocal about tackling such issues.

Recently the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology issued notice to social media firms on clamping down deepfake issue.