Supreme Court upholds sentence against deepfake porn creator

Taipei, May 9 (CNA) The Supreme Court on Wednesday rejected an appeal by a Taiwanese YouTuber and upheld his five-year prison sentence by a lower court for creating nonconsensual deepfake pornography featuring the likenesses of real individuals.

In its ruling, the Supreme Court said there was no error in the sentence handed down by the Taiwan High Court in Chu Yu-chen's (朱玉宸) second trial last year, adding that the verdict was justified based on solid evidence.

Chu, who goes by Xiaoyu (小玉) on YouTube, was found guilty in July 2022 by the New Taipei District Court of violating the Personal Data Protection Act for editing the likenesses of 119 individuals including politicians and social media influencers into pornographic videos.

According to court documents, he along with his assistant Chuang Hsin-jui (莊炘睿) made over NT$10 million (US$308,372) from distributing those videos.

Chu was given a five-and-a-half-year sentence, while Chuang received three years and eight months, but both were commutable to a fine.

An appeal was later filed by prosecutors, who argued that the sentence was too lenient as they could each pay a fine in lieu of jail time.

In December last year, the Taiwan High Court revoked the original sentence and revised Chu's imprisonment to five years, which cannot be commuted to a fine.

Using the likeness of individuals to create deepfake porn videos of them for public viewing not only tarnishes their reputation but also harms the mental health of victims, the Supreme Court ruled.

Chu will have to serve an additional 20 months in prison if he is unable to pay a fine after the high court imposed sentencing enhancements.

Meanwhile, the high court at the time also increased Chuang's sentence to four and a half years, commutable to a fine.

Chu and Chuang subsequently filed an appeal against the verdicts, but the original verdicts were upheld by the Supreme Court on Wednesday and its decision is final.