The Downside of Improved AI Technology! Posters of popular female announcer’s “underwear composite images” were sold at an online auction.

Remember the term “icola?”

The eye in icola is not the eye of AI, but the idol’s eye, and the colla is the collage of collage. The term was coined to describe a photo that combines the face of an idol with the neck part of another person’s swimsuit or nude image. In the early 1990s, the number of such photos rapidly increased in Japan and caused a sensation. Recently, images of popular female TV announcers created using this “latest iconography technology” were sold on a major Internet auction site.

Iconic images of popular female announcers of commercial TV stations

The existence of the images was first noticed in early August. The name of the item is “A (editor’s note: the name of the actual female announcer on the actual site), very beautiful announcer, knit lingerie, A1 size, poster” and the price is “currently 3000 yen, immediate sale 7500 yen, shipping 880 yen for Tokyo”. At least four image posters of A wearing sexy lingerie were sold.

Of course, it is obvious at a glance that they are iconic images, but they are much more elaborate than in the past. The images were still being sold at online auctions in late August.

Just the other day, a high school girl in the U.S. casually uploaded a photo of her memories and graduation album to a social networking service, only to have it turned into a naked image and scattered around, as reported on NHK news.

In South Korea, there have been a number of incidents in which fake sexual images are created based on the facial photos of acquaintances, classmates, and other women close to them that have been made public on SNS, etc., and then shared and spread via the Telegram communication application,” said a reporter from the society department of a national newspaper.

In fact, composite photos existed before this kind of technology was invented, but most of them were crude, as if the photos were cut out, pasted together, and then photographed again. However, with the spread of personal computers and the availability of inexpensive photo editing software, even amateurs were able to create icons easily.

As the Internet became widespread, more and more people began posting photos of not only idols but also actresses, athletes, and other celebrities as icons on the Internet, which was considered an infringement of copyright and portrait rights, as well as a possible obstruction of business on the grounds that it would damage the image of celebrities. Icons became a social problem. However, the celebrity side did not remain silent.

‘Even Icora has people who will buy it.’

In September ’07, a female announcer at a local station filed a criminal complaint with the Osaka Prefectural Police against a magazine company for defamation and violation of the Copyright Act for publishing a false article by Icora using a picture of her face obtained from the company’s website.

It has long been pointed out that publishing icons constitutes a criminal act, and it was thought that no one would be doing business with icons today, but one can only be surprised to find icora posters being sold with impunity on major Internet auction sites.

However, we can only be surprised at the fact that icola posters are being sold on major online auction sites.

The people who buy them know that they are icons,” said one of the buyers. Even if it is a fake, the fact that the innocent female announcer is in an impossible pose must be irresistible to the maniacs.

I wondered if the TV station where A works was aware of this situation. When we inquired, it seemed that they were still unaware of the situation and would take immediate action. They responded as follows.

We have been taking necessary measures against illegal images and videos, such as requesting their removal. We will continue to take a strict stance against such images and videos.

As of mid-September, a check showed that the poster was no longer for sale on the online auction site. It is believed that the TV station requested the seller to remove the page. Attorney Yuka Furufuji of Hibiki Lawyers explains as follows.

Some images have been viewed more than 3 million times.

AI images are new images generated based on original data. If, for example, images generated based on multiple original data resemble a real person, the identity or relevance between the original data and the AI image in question may become an issue. However, since the images in this case are being sold as belonging to the relevant female announcer, even if they are AI images, there shall be no issues regarding identity or relevance.

Based on this premise, the act of creating an image or photo that is unwanted by the person depicted in the image or photo and publishing it is defamation against that person. In this case, the images of the person in underwear and swimsuit are highly private and sexual in nature, so even if permission had been requested, it is quite possible that the person in question would not have wanted the images to be published.

Similar to this case, for example, a website administrator who used “Deep Fake” to publish adult video clips in which the actors’ faces were replaced with those of famous celebrities was arrested on charges of defamation (in November 2008, the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department and the Chiba Prefectural Police Department arrested the site administrator for uploading the videos to the Internet). and Chiba Prefectural Police arrested a system engineer and a university student for uploading the video to the Internet).

In addition, the person who took the original photo has the copyright to the original data, so using it without the copyright holder’s permission is also an infringement of the copyright holder’s copyright,” said Yuka Furufuji, an attorney at Lawyer Hibiki.

If a victim files a damage report, what kind of investigation will be conducted, what kind of charges will be attached, and how much will the charges be?

As stated above, the crime of defamation (Article 230, Paragraph 1 of the Penal Code) will be committed against the person whose data was originally reported, and he/she may be sentenced to imprisonment or imprisonment for up to three years or a fine of up to 500,000 yen. The sentence will vary depending on the number of products sold and the degree to which the victim’s reputation was harmed by the extreme nature of the photos, so the outlook for the sentence is unclear at this time.

On pornographic video sites, there are deep-fake videos of Japanese actresses and idols, some of which have been viewed more than 3 million times. It is said that many deep fakes of female celebrities are still available on the Internet.

It should be noted that creating icons for the purpose of selling them, of course, but also creating icons for fun and publishing them on the Internet is also a criminal act.