Over 80% of deepfake sex crime offenders in Korea are teens

[Artaxerxes II]

https://www.chosun.com/english/national ... KIGGEHT4M/:

In August, a middle school student from Chungcheong Province, South Korea, contacted a deepfake company on Telegram. He provided a photo of his female homeroom teacher and requested that her face be used to make pornographic content. He even asked for specific “options,” such as breast size and posture. His homeroom teacher reported the incident to the police, and he was charged as a sex offender. Although he claimed to have committed the crime “out of curiosity,” he was forced to transfer schools and now faces criminal penalties.

South Korea faces an epidemic of deepfake sex crimes, where hundreds of girls and women are targeted through non-consensual, explicit pornographic videos shared online.

According to the police on Oct. 25, of the 474 individuals arrested for deepfake sex crimes from January to October this year, 381 (80.3%) were teenagers. The teens told police they “just wanted to see if it worked” and “wanted to try making such video just once.” While the victimized women describe the experience as soul-destroying, the young offenders were often oblivious to the harm they caused and viewed deepfake pornography as “fun.”

“The teenagers lacked the awareness that creating and watching deepfake porn is a serious crime that causes harm to others,” said a police official.

An average of ten deepfake sex crime cases have been reported every day since the police launched an intensive crackdown on Aug. 28. In one incident, the Daegu Metropolitan Police arrested a middle school student who created deepfake videos by merging photos of female classmates with nude upper bodies and posted them on social media. The Gwangju Police Department arrested a high school student who created similar deepfake content using photos of 29 female classmates.

Some teenagers have been arrested for creating deepfake videos to earn pocket money. The Suwon District Prosecutors’ Office detained and charged a high school student who made deepfake pornographic content in exchange for cash. He sold the content via Telegram, charging 1,000 to 2,000 won (approximately $0.75 to $1.50) per video. He reportedly sold 116 items, earning about 300,000 to 400,000 won. The teen showed no remorse during questioning, stating that he “learned how to make deepfake videos to earn money.”

“The problem with deepfake pornography is that the technology behind it is so detailed and sophisticated that it almost seems real,” said Min Go-eun, director of human rights at the Korean Women Lawyers Association. “The shame and humiliation experienced by victims is no different from those affected by illegal recordings.” She stressed that perpetrators should be held accountable and that teenagers should be better educated on the severity of such a crime.

While the government has taken steps to address this issue, experts say there’s still a long way to go. South Korean lawmakers passed a bill that criminalizes possessing or watching sexually explicit deepfake images and videos last month, with penalties including fines of up to 30 million won or up to three years in prison.