New York A 1280: Establishes the crime of unlawful dissemination or publication of a fabricated photographic, videographic, or audio record

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A01280 Summary:

BILL NOA01280 

&nbsp

SAME ASNo Same As

&nbsp

SPONSORVanel (MS)

&nbsp

COSPNSRHyndman, Zaccaro, Simon, Glick

&nbsp

MLTSPNSRLevenberg

&nbsp

Add §245.20, Pen L

&nbsp

Establishes the crime of unlawful dissemination or publication of a fabricated photographic, videographic, or audio record as a class E felony.

Go to top A01280 Actions:

BILL NOA01280 

&nbsp

01/09/2025referred to codes

01/07/2026referred to codes

Go to topA01280 Committee&nbspVotes:

Go to topA01280 Floor&nbspVotes:

There are no Assembly votes for this bill in this legislative session.

Go to topA01280 Text:

 STATE OF NEW YORK
 ________________________________________________________________________

 1280

 2025-2026 Regular Sessions

 IN ASSEMBLY

 January 9, 2025
 ___________

 Introduced by M. of A. VANEL, HYNDMAN, ZACCARO, SIMON, GLICK -- Multi-
 Sponsored by -- M. of A. LEVENBERG -- read once and referred to the
 Committee on Codes

 AN ACT to amend the penal law, in relation to unlawful dissemination or
 publication of a fabricated photographic, videographic, or audio
 record

 The People of the State of New York, represented in Senate and Assem-
 bly, do enact as follows:

 1 Section 1. The penal law is amended by adding a new section 245.20 to
 2 read as follows:
 3 § 245.20 Unlawful dissemination or publication of a fabricated photo-
 4 graphic, videographic, or audio record.
 5 1. A person is guilty of unlawful dissemination or publication of a
 6 fabricated photographic, videographic, or audio record when, with intent
 7 to cause harm to the liberty or emotional, social, financial or physical
 8 welfare of an identifiable person or persons, such principal person
 9 intentionally creates or causes to be created a fabricated record of
 10 such person or persons and disseminates or publishes such record of such
 11 person or persons without such person or persons' consent.
 12 2. For purposes of this section:
 13 (a) "Identifiable" shall mean the ability to discern an individual's
 14 identity either through the fabricated record itself or from information
 15 displayed in connection with the fabricated record;
 16 (b) "Fabricated photographic, videographic, or audio record" or
 17 "fabricated record" shall mean a still image, video or audio recording
 18 that:
 19 (i) exhibits a high level of authenticity or convincing appearance
 20 that is visually or audibly indistinguishable from reality;
 21 (ii) is either manipulated or entirely artificial, including but not
 22 limited to, manipulation through means of advanced synthetic media tech-

 EXPLANATION--Matter in italics (underscored) is new; matter in brackets
 [ ] is old law to be omitted.
 LBD04102-01-5

 A. 1280 2

 1 nologies that utilize artificial intelligence, such as deepfakes, gener-
 2 ative pre-trained transformers and stable diffusion;
 3 (iii) depicts a scenario that did not actually occur or that has been
 4 altered in a significant way from how it actually occurred; and
 5 (c) "Disseminate" and "publish" shall have the same meanings as
 6 defined in section 250.40 of this title.
 7 3. This section shall not apply to the following:
 8 (a) Dissemination or publication of a fabricated record by a person
 9 who did not create the fabricated record, whether or not such person is
 10 aware of the authenticity of the record;
 11 (b) Dissemination or publication of a fabricated record that was
 12 created during the lawful and common practices of law enforcement, legal
 13 proceedings or medical treatment where the record is not disseminated or
 14 published with the intent to misrepresent its authenticity;
 15 (c) Dissemination or publication of a fabricated record that was
 16 created for the purpose of political or social commentary, parody,
 17 satire, or artistic expression that is not disseminated or published
 18 with the intent to misrepresent its authenticity;
 19 (d) Dissemination or publication of a fabricated record that was
 20 created for the purpose of news reporting where the record is not
 21 disseminated or published with the intent to misrepresent its authentic-
 22 ity;
 23 (e) Dissemination or publication of a fabricated record that was
 24 created where the person reasonably believes that the dissemination or
 25 publication of the record is necessary to protect themselves from s