Bill targets pedophiles who create AI child porn
A bill by Republican Ohio lawmakers would punish pedophiles for creating, distributing, or possessing child AI pornography, thus extending the protection of minors in the state.
Senate Bill 393, introduced by state Sens. Jane Timken, R-Jackson Township, and Nathan Manning, R-North Ridgeville, would force pedophiles who create, distribute, or possess AI child porn to face the same punishment that pedophiles who create child porn with real children face.
The punishment would extend to the material that involves real children that was later altered by AI in a bid for pedophiles to avoid prosecution, since the final version doesn’t look like the original photos and videos that show a real child.
People who support strict laws against the AI child porn told the state Senate Judiciary Committee that pedophiles have been using this loophole to avoid persecution, according to Cleveland.com.
Alaina Hagans, director of the Ohio Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force, told the Cleveland outlet that pedophiles combine the photo of a child with the photo of another nude body, which saves them from the Ohio law enforcement agencies and judges.
“Defendants increasingly attempt to evade accountability by claiming that the material is ‘not real,’” she said, according to the news source. “But these artificially generated images are no less obscene. They erode the most basic community standards of decency — standards that unequivocally reject the sexual exploitation of children. A society that tolerates such material, whether AI-generated or real, cannot be accepted.”
Lou Tobin of the Ohio Prosecuting Attorneys Association also said that the rapidly evolving AI made it almost impossible to identify what is real and what is fake, which makes the problem even worse, considering that AI child porn cases skyrocketed in recent years – 4,700 cases in 2023 to 67,000 cases in 2024, according to The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.
Even though the current Ohio state law criminalizes the creation, distribution and possession of child pornography that involves real minors, it doesn’t cover the AI child pornography. If Republican Gov. Mike DeWine signs the bill, Ohio would become among the majority of states that passed the laws targeting AI child pornography, a 2025 report by Enough Abuse revealed.
The bill, however, does not cover AI child porn that was generated completely without photos or videos of a real minor. AI developer Chris Graham suggested using AI itself to deal with the problem.
“What if AI was a mandatory reporter?” he said, according to Cleveland.com. “What if these algorithms, when they detect that they are being used to create child sexual abuse material, these companies immediately flag it? The technology — we have it. It’s not difficult to do.”
Emily Gemar of the Ohio Alliance to End Sexual Violence also said that penalties for AI child porn “should more accurately reflect the nature of the conduct — such as creation, distribution, coercion, volume and intent — rather than distinctions in victim age,” according to the news source.
State House and Senate members previously introduced bills to combat AI child porn, including House Bill 185, House Bill 469, House Bill 524, House Bill 786, Senate Bill 163, and Senate Bill 164.
