OpenAI just did something unusual for a tech company: it publicly backed a law that could make its own technology more legally consequential. The company endorsed the DEFIANCE Act on June 24, a bipartisan bill that would create a federal civil cause of action for victims of nonconsensual sexually explicit deepfakes.
That makes OpenAI the first major AI company to proactively support legislation specifically targeting harmful AI-generated intimate imagery.
What the DEFIANCE Act actually does
The bill’s mechanism is straightforward. It would allow victims of nonconsensual intimate deepfakes to sue individuals who knowingly produce, distribute, solicit, or possess such content with the intent to distribute it.
Victims would be able to seek monetary damages, with a reported minimum of $150,000 per incident, along with injunctions to force the removal of the content.
