Columbia, South Carolina (WACH) – South Carolina Attorney General Alan Wilson said the challenges they face with artificial intelligence are similar to when the internet first appeared in the 1990s.
He explained that current laws are outdated and need to be changed.
“The bad guys are finding ways to exploit the legal gaps and loopholes, as is written now,” Wilson said.
He says the proposal at the Capitol building would allow prosecution of people who use AI-generated images of children engaged in sexual activity.
“This will catch these types of cases where people are taking people to the internet and generating content designed to find children engaged in sexual activity we consider to be a crime,” Wilson said.
Amanda Whittle, director of the SC Children’s Advocacy Bureau, says he’s heard a lot of horror stories. “What I’ve heard is that people have seen images of a child’s face on someone else’s body, and of course, for parents, it’s almost impossible to retrieve it when it comes to the internet,” Whittle said.
The effects of AI-generated child sexual abuse materials (CSAMs) are not hypothetical. The example Amanda Whittle is talking about happened in South Carolina. There, photos of the children were taken from social media and manipulated with sexual content using AI.
Between 2023 and 2024, the National Center for Missing Persons and Exploited Children (NCMEC) received over 7,000 reports, including AI-generated CSAM.
“By cleaning up the language to incorporate this new technology in AI, we can prevent some of these cases from being dumped,” Wilson said, “people don’t have the first right to make fake child porn with the sole purpose of increasing the demand for actual child porn.” Wilson continued.
Another bill, Wilson, allows authorities to chase predators without going to the federal government to identify suspects from IP addresses.
“This bill allows the South Carolina Attorney General’s state to actually do it on their own. You don’t have to go to the federal government. You can find the person’s identity and run a search warrant,” Wilson said.
If these proposals are passed and the governor signs the law, they could take effect immediately next month.
