BILL NUMBER: S6954A
SPONSOR: GOUNARDES
 
TITLE OF BILL:
An act to amend the general business law, in relation to requiring
synthetic content creations system providers to include provenance data
on synthetic content produced or modified by a synthetic content
creations system that the synthetic content creations system provider
makes available
 
PURPOSE OR GENERAL IDEA OF BILL:
To require synthetic content creation system providers to apply prove-
nance data to synthetic content produced by their systems
 
SUMMARY OF PROVISIONS:
Section one of this bill names it the Stop Deepfakes Act
Section two of the bill adds a new Article 45-A to General Business Law
(GBL) to establish the Stop Deepfakes Act.
Section 1510 of Article 45-A provides definitions.
Section 1511 of Article 45-A implements requirements for synthetic
content creation providers and requires the attachment of metadata
consistent with the standards set by the Coalition for Content Prove-
nance and Authenticity or an equivalent standard.
Section 1512 of Article 45-A establishes that social media platforms may
not remove metadata attached to uploaded content.
Section 1513 of Article 45-A Implements requirements for state agencies
to adopt metadata attachment mechanisms to the extent practicable.
Section 1514 establishes enforcement by the NYS Attorney General.
Section three of this bill sets the effective date.
 
JUSTIFICATION:
This legislation, which is based on a similar law in California, seeks
to ensure transparency and accountability in the use of generative arti-
ficial intelligence (AI) by requiring the attachment and preservation of
metadata by synthetic content creation systems, social media platforms,
and state agencies. The rapid advancement of AI technologies has made it
increasingly difficult for consumers to distinguish between human-creat-
ed and AI-generated content, raising concerns about misinformation,
manipulation, and the erosion of trust in digital media. By mandating
that AI providers include clear provenance data-either directly or
through third-party technology-this bill will enable the public to iden-
tify the origins and alterations of AI-generated content.
In line with current industry best practices, this light-touch bill
would help establish clear demarcations between what is real and fake
online. The data attached would be embedded within the content itself,
allowing for a visual standard or tag that would, by default, come with
all content, Al-generated or otherwise. The Stop Deepfakes Act imposes
three requirements - synthetic content creation providers have to attach
metadata, social media platforms have to preserve metadata, and state
agencies have to attach the data to the extent practicable.
This kind of data is attached to images, videos, and audio all the time,
and thus it is a relatively small burden to add a bit more data to
ensure that AI-generated content is clearly indicated.
 
PRIOR LEGISLATIVE HISTORY:
None
 
FISCAL IMPLICATIONS:
TBD
 
EFFECTIVE DATE:
This act shall take effect on the one hundred eightieth day after it
shall have become a law.