Senator Wahab’s AI Safety Policy Package Sent to Governor’s Desk

Sacramento, CA —State Senator Dr. Aisha Wahab’s (D-Silicon Valley) SB 1381—AI Child Safety Bill—passed the legislature with bipartisan support, and will ensure AI-generated imagery is appropriately covered in child pornography laws.

“With AI-driven image editing apps, more and more children—and women—are susceptible to harm and victimization through digital sexual exploitation," said Dr. Wahab. "SB 1381 will ensure predators are met with the full weight of the law for violating children through AI-generated imagery.”

SB 1381 is part of the Dr. Wahab’s AI Safety Policy Package, which includes SB 926, Safeguarding Against Digitized Misrepresentation, and SB 981, Digital Identity Theft Act—all of which received bipartisan support across the legislature.

A 2023 Stanford Internet Observatory investigation revealed images of child sexual abuse material being used to train AI text-to-image generation models, highlighting the need for stronger regulation. Sensity AI stated in 2021 that up to 95% of online deepfake videos since 2018 were nonconsensual porn. Of those non-consensual videos, 90% are of women. Senator Wahab, when speaking about SB 926, stated that these AI-generated images can ruin an individual’s entire life leading to a lack of workplace promotions, mental health deterioration, shame, and social isolation.

SB 981 rounds out the Senator’s bill package by combatting the growing problem of sexually explicit digital identity theft on social media platforms. In January, a digitized sexually explicit video of Taylor Swift went viral on X, garnering over 27 million views and 260,000 likes in 19 hours, before the videos were permanently blocked from the platform

SB 1381 and SB 981 are sponsored by the Los Angeles District Attorney’s Office, and Crime Victims Alliance sponsored SB 926.

SB 1381 will now join SB 926 and SB 981 on the Governor’s Desk.