Deepfake videos exploit women's and celebrity likenesses without consent
Deepfake videos created using AI depicted celebrities including Scarlett Johansson and others protesting antisemitic remarks without their consent. The incident highlights broader risks that deepfake technology poses to women's image rights and personal privacy, with sexual deepfakes reportedly disproportionately targeting women.
What happened
An AI-generated deepfake video surfaced in February 2025 depicting celebrities including Scarlett Johansson, Lenny Kravitz, Ben Stiller, and Adam Sandler appearing to protest Kanye West's antisemitic comments. The celebrities were shown wearing white T-shirts with an offensive hand gesture and Kanye's name, created and distributed without their permission.
Deepfakes represent a technological advancement in image and video manipulation that enables creation of realistic but fabricated videos of people saying or doing things they never actually did. The malicious use of deepfakes, particularly in violating women's images on social media, raises serious legal concerns regarding personal image protection.
Reported impact
Scarlett Johansson stated that the potential for hate speech multiplied by AI is 'a far greater threat than any one person who takes accountability for it,' highlighting risks to personal privacy, reputation, and public safety. The incident sparked criticism over the misuse of AI and prompted broader conversation about dangers posed to individuals regardless of original intention.
Sexual deepfakes disproportionately target women and pose particular concerns for women's intellectual property and image rights protection.
Index analysis
In France, Article 9 of the French Civil Code protects image rights by guaranteeing respect for an individual's private life. The French SREN Law, approved in May 2024, specifically addresses deepfakes, making distribution of a deepfake without the subject's consent punishable by one year's imprisonment and a €15,000 fine, increased to two years and €45,000 if distributed online.
The European Regulation on AI mandates that providers must apply technical markers to generated content and inform users that images or videos have been artificially created, with non-compliance resulting in fines of up to €15 million or 3% of global revenue.
Governance controls
Individuals can report deepfake content to the platform hosting it and to law enforcement authorities. Social media platforms typically allow takedown requests under community guidelines; for example, TikTok provides users information on how to report a post as misinformation and manipulated media.
In November 2024, French courts condemned Google for indexing violent pornographic videos without victims' consent, establishing growing liability of search engines in the diffusion of such content.
Classification
Sources and evidence
Sources not yet published
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