The Federal Communications Commission today outlawed robocalls that use voices generated by artificial intelligence to crack down on deepfake technologies that may scam individuals and mislead voters.

The initiative took immediate effect today, according to the unanimous ruling, which extends the FCC’s anti-robocall rules to cover calls that use artificially created or prerecorded voices that emulate human speech to annoy or deceive.

“No matter what celebrity or politician you favor, or what your relationship is with your kin when they call for help, it is possible we could all be on the receiving end of these faked calls,” said FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel. “That is why at the Federal Communications Commission, we are taking action to stop the bad actors responsible for this junk.”

Under the new rules, those who evade the ban can face fines up to more than $23,000 per infraction, the FCC said. The commission is no stranger to investigating and striking down robocallers and scammers who break the rules. In August, the FCC handed out the largest enforcement in its history meeting out $300 million in fines in response to an operation that made more than five billion spam calls in three months in 2021.

Not all AI voice-generated calls are banned by the new rules, but those who use such voices must disclose that they are using simulated voices before initiating the call. Otherwise, the robocaller will be breaking the new rules.

This announcement comes days after New Hampshire Attorney General John Formella announced the results of an investigation of deepfaked AI-generated robocalls from President Joe Biden to residents of New Hampshire that told Democrats not to vote in the primary election. The investigation traced the calls to the Texas-based telemarketing outfit Life Corp., which originated with the service provider Lingo Telecom.

Both New Hampshire and the FCC sent cease-and-desist letters to Life and Lingo Telecom to prevent further AI-generated calls from being sent. However, Lingo terminated all services with Life upon discovering it was at the center of an investigation.

“Ensuring public confidence in the electoral process is vital,” Formella said at the time. “AI-generated recordings used to deceive voters have the potential to have devastating effects on the democratic election process.”

Voter and election misinformation campaigns are not the only type of scams perpetrated by voice cloning and AI-generated deepfake technology. Attackers also prey upon vulnerable individuals to dupe them out of money by frightening them into thinking their children are in trouble or tricking them into buying services they don’t need.

“We all know unwanted robocalls are a scourge on our society. But I am particularly troubled by recent harmful and deceptive uses of voice cloning in robocalls,” said FCC Commissioner Geoffrey Starks. “Real world examples here are no longer theoretical.”

Image: Pixabay