Approximately 1 in 6 female members of the European Parliament have fallen victim to artificial intelligence (AI)-generated deepfake pornography.

The political news outlet Politico reported on the 5th (local time), citing a report by the German civil society organization 'Agora Digital Transformation', that 46 female European Parliament members have been targeted by deepfakes.

In addition, four male lawmakers were also victims of deepfake pornography.

Deepfake pornography consists of sexually explicit images or videos created using AI without the consent of the individuals involved.

The civic group pointed out that politicians, whose faces and appearances are inevitably exposed online, easily become targets for deepfakes.

Previously, the European Parliament passed a legal amendment banning apps used to create deepfake pornography.

Accordingly, such apps will be completely banned throughout the European Union (EU) starting December 2nd.

On the 30th of last month, 119 members of the European Parliament sent a letter to EU leaders, including European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, urging them to effectively enforce the ban.

They also urged that investigations be swiftly concluded regarding allegations that Grok, a service on the social media platform X, may have been used to generate deepfakes.

Meanwhile, the civil society organization that published the report argued that to effectively enforce the ban on apps used to generate pornography, liability must also be extended to payment gateway providers and domain registrars.

They also suggested considering measures to obligate search engines to exclude deepfake generation sites from their search results.

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