OLYMPIA, Wash. — Washington residents now have more protections in the digital world after Gov. Jay Inslee signed a new bill into law on March 14 concerning artificially fabricated porn.
House Bill 1999, sponsored by State Rep. Tina Orwall (D-Des Moines), provides more protections for people against the creation and circulation of fabricated intimate images, including deepfakes and digitally altered, sexually explicit images of minors, according to the bill.
“The online exploitation of intimate images has a devastating impact on individuals, ultimately leaving lasting scars,” Orwall said. "We have a responsibility to protect Washingtonians from this type of abuse in all forms. With this law, survivors of intimate and fabricated image-based violence have a path to justice and must no longer tolerate being harmed.”
It is now illegal for people to create, possess, distribute or view fabricated, sexually explicit images of minors, the bill states. The bill also targets people who "knowingly disclose fabricated intimate images of others without their consent, causing harm to the depicted person," according to the governor's office. Defendants could face a gross misdemeanor for the first offense.
Fabricated images are defined as any photo, videotape, digital image, or other recording that was created or altered by digitization or computer-generated, the bill states.
Intimate images published and disseminated without the person's consent are often referred to as "revenge porn."
Any valid consent for the disclosure of such images requires written consent, as part of the bill's new civil cause of action under the Uniform Civil Remedies for the Unauthorized Disclosure of Intimate Images Act (UCRUDIIA) for both adult and children.
Concern in Washington state over artificial intelligence (A.I.) images stemmed from a November 2023 incident, when A.I.-generated nude photos of Issaquah High School students began circulating.
The Issaquah Police Department investigated, but at the time, there were no Washington laws in place that made this type of pornography illegal, as child pornography laws require real pictures of real people, according to previous KING 5 coverage.
