‘Principle of arrest and investigation’ deepfake crime… What if you were wrongfully implicated?

-Legal column by Park Ji-young, criminal lawyer at Daeryun Law Firm (Limited)

Advances in digital technology have made it possible to precisely represent real people in videos or images. Abusing this point is the deepfake (false video) crime. Deepfake is a compound word of deep learning and fake, and refers to a technology that synthesizes photos and videos using AI (artificial intelligence). For example, the method of creating composite images of famous people is to defame the victims and invade their privacy.

The reason deepfake has recently emerged as a serious social problem is because this technology is being used to produce pornography. The level of damage is very serious as the faces of others are composited and distributed in pornography or sexually exploitative material that causes sexual shame. In fact, the number of deepfake sex crime cases reported to the National Police Agency has increased more than six-fold, from 156 in 2021 to 964 as of October this year. In addition, the number of victims supported by the Digital Sex Crime Support Center also increased seven-fold from 176 to 1,201 during the same period.

The bigger problem is that once deepfake crimes begin, the damage spreads rapidly and uncontrollably. In particular, since most videos are shared through messengers based on overseas servers such as Telegram, it is not easy to detect those who spread them. Additionally, as videos are reproduced through multiple channels, complete deletion is often difficult.

As the controversy surrounding deepfakes grows, the government's efforts to eradicate digital sex crimes have also become busy. Recently, the government announced a plan to make it a principle to arrest and investigate suspects of deepfake sex crimes, and to confiscate and collect all property and profits obtained from the crime. In particular, the Sexual Violence Punishment Act has been revised to allow for disguised investigations even when the victim is an adult, improving the previous situation where disguised investigations were only possible when the victim was a child or adolescent.

The level of punishment has also been strengthened. The legal penalty for those who edit and distribute deepfake videos has been increased from 5 years to 7 years in prison. In addition, the phrase ‘for the purpose of distributing, etc.’ was deleted from the criminal requirements, making punishment possible even if the intention to disseminate is not clearly proven. Last September, the Ministry of Justice also revised the law to allow punishment for possession, purchase, storage, and viewing of deepfake sex crime materials.

Minors are no exception to the punishment of deepfake crimes. In fact, a teenager was arrested for selling false videos last September, and it was discovered that the high school student composited the faces of acquaintances, such as classmates and teachers, into nude photos and sold them to make pocket money. As legal punishment is becoming more stringent, if you are involved in a related crime, it is necessary to get help from a professional attorney as soon as possible rather than taking individual action such as arbitrarily deleting the video or erasing the viewing history.

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