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South Korean authorities mentioned on Wednesday (August 28, 2024) that they plan to ask Telegram and different social media platforms to assist extra actively with the elimination and blocking of sexually express deepfake content material, a part of measures aimed toward tackling the rising downside.
The measures come amid public and political outrage after a number of home media shops reported that sexually express deepfake photos and movies of South Korean ladies have been typically present in Telegram chat rooms.
A 24-hour hotline for victims may even be arrange and the variety of regulatory employees monitoring digital sexual crimes will likely be doubled from the present variety of 70, the Korea Communications Requirements Fee mentioned.
The Korean Nationwide Police Company additionally mentioned it would launch a seven-month effort to crack down on on-line intercourse crimes.
The media watchdog plans to arrange an advisory physique to enhance communication with social media corporations on eradicating and blocking false sexual content material, its chairman Ryu Hee-lim mentioned at a gathering on the problem.
For corporations that don’t have places of work in South Korea, the purpose is to ascertain a face-to-face channel for normal consultations.
“The manufacturing, possession and distribution of deepfake movies about sexual crimes is a critical crime that destroys particular person dignity and private rights,” Ryu mentioned.
Along with Telegram, the fee mentioned it might search cooperation from X, in addition to Fb and Meta’s Instagram and Google’s YouTube. Not one of the corporations responded to Reuters’ request for remark.
The criticism of Telegram in South Korea coincided with the arrest of Pavel Durov, the Russian-born founding father of Telegram, over the weekend as a part of a French investigation into little one pornography, drug trafficking and fraud on the encrypted messaging app.
The variety of deepfake intercourse crime instances in South Korea has risen from 156 in 2021, when the primary knowledge was collected, to 297 to date this yr, with many of the perpetrators being youngsters, in line with police knowledge.
The victims are sometimes ladies, together with college students and feminine troopers within the South Korean military.
South Koreans have submitted greater than 6,400 requests to the Korea Communications Requirements Fee for assist eradicating sexually express deepfake content material this yr, up from practically 7,200 instances final yr during which the fee agreed to assist take away the content material.
