Meta’s Oversight Board has referred to as on the social media firm to strengthen its safety for abnormal individuals focused by sexualized deepfakes. The Board recommends the addition of AI-generated impersonations in Meta’s Grownup Sexual Exploitation coverage, arguing that these photographs and movies are non-consensual by default. It additionally desires Meta to permit customers to designate “linked accounts,” reminiscent of trusted family and friends, who can report potential violations like non-consensual intimate imagery on their behalf.
Lastly, the Board recommends making AI-generated sexual impersonation a separate class from harassment and nudity within the firm’s content material reporting and enchantment varieties. For the time being, solely the residents of Texas and Florida have entry to a specialised kind that lists deepfake intimate imagery as a purpose for the report. The Board desires all Meta customers to have entry to it, as a result of “AI-generated non-consensual intimate abuse, together with sexualized impersonations, is a worldwide subject.”
The Meta Oversight Board got here up with these suggestions after investigating an incident whereby the corporate stored ignoring a person’s report in regards to the sexualized impersonation of a buddy on Instagram. It launched the investigation after it acquired an enchantment from the person who reported an AI-generated video on Instagram exhibiting a girl adjusting her gown, along with her underwear seen in a couple of frames. In response to the Board’s report, the reporter stated they had been a buddy of the individual being impersonated within the video with out content material. The one who was depicted within the AI video had already closed her account.
Two customers initially reported the video to Meta, however the firm did not take away the deepfake. The person who appealed to the Board had submitted an enchantment to Meta first, however the firm nonetheless did not take away the video from Instagram. After the Board itself raised the difficulty with Meta, the corporate merely made the put up adults-only however concluded that it didn’t benefit elimination below its group requirements.
Meta informed the Board that on the time the put up was initially reported, it had no indications that the person within the AI deepfake was an actual individual. If the depicted particular person herself had reported the video, it will have violated its Grownup Sexual Exploitation coverage. The self-report would have served as a transparent signal of non-consent. Different credible indicators of non-consent in Meta’s eyes are experiences from legislation enforcement, media or trusted companions. Captions or web page titles suggesting that photographs or movies are shared in a “vengeful or sensationalist method” will work, as effectively.
The Board says Meta’s responses to its investigation signifies that the one viable method for private figures to determine non-consent is to self-report. It would not be simple for abnormal individuals to get legislation enforcement or the media concerned, in any case. These avenues are principally accessible to public figures. Meta is required to answer these suggestions, but it surely’s not obligated to implement them. If it does select to undertake them, the Board will monitor its implementations. For the actual case that began this investigation, the Board has overturned Meta’s determination to depart the video up and has required the corporate to take away the put up.
“It’s clear that the dimensions, pace and class of AI instruments have resulted in a proliferation of AI-generated sexualized non-consensual content material globally. The unfold of sexualized deepfake movies results in reputational and psychological hurt, which disproportionately impacts girls and ladies, and has a chilling impact on participation in social and political life,” the Board wrote in its report of the investigation.
This is not the primary time the Board has been vital of Meta in issues involving AI content material and moderation. In mid-2025, it referred to as the corporate’s incapacity to implement its guidelines persistently “incoherent and unjustifiable.” Again in March, the Board urged Meta to create a new rule for AI content material that is separate from its misinformation coverage. That suggestion got here from an investigation involving an AI-generated video that claimed to indicate broken buildings within the Israeli metropolis of Haifa. The video was posted by an account claiming to be a information outlet however was really ran by a person within the Philippines.
