The Federal Communications Commission is moving to explicitly criminalize unsolicited robocalls that use artificial intelligence-powered voices, the agency announced Wednesday.
The announcement comes on the heels of a fake message created with AI to imitate President Joe Biden’s voice instructing New Hampshire residents not to vote in the state’s primary election.
The proposal would outlaw such robocalls under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA), a 1991 law that regulates automated political and marketing calls made without the recipient’s consent. .
The TCPA has been used in several high-profile prosecutions of illegal robocalls. Last year, the FCC fined conservative activists $5 million in 2020 for arranging for Black voters to receive false phone calls telling them that if they voted, they could be arrested by debt collectors or police. The FCC has fined companies $300 million for spamming phones. Comes with an advertisement for a car warranty.
An FCC spokesperson said the five-member commission is expected to vote on the changes in the coming weeks.
The changes, among other things, will allow state attorneys general to take legal action against spammers who use AI, a spokesperson said. The New Hampshire Attorney General’s Office announced an investigation into Biden’s fake phone call.
“AI-generated voice clones and images are already causing confusion by making consumers believe that fraud and fraudulent activity is legitimate,” FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel said in an emailed statement. It’s causing it,” he said.
“No matter which celebrity or politician you support, no matter what your relationship with your family is when they call for help, we can all be targeted by these fake calls. It’s sexual,” she says.
Kathy Stokes, director of fraud prevention programs at AARP (formerly the American Association of Retired Persons), welcomed the FCC’s move, saying AI-powered robocalls routinely scam seniors.
“In this country, we have deprioritised fraud as a crime because our knee-jerk reaction is to blame the victim for not knowing something.” said Stokes.
“We can’t educate our way out of this situation,” she said.
