The Delhi High Court on Friday said it will issue orders for the immediate removal of deepfake videos created using artificial intelligence tools that falsely portrayed Congress MP Shashi Tharoor as making politically sensitive statements.
Justice Mini Pushkarna said it would also issue directions barring entities from misusing Tharoor’s character, thus protecting his personal rights.
“The orders will be passed. They will be charged,” Justice Pushkarna told Tharoor’s lawyer Amit Sibal.
The court issued this direction while hearing Tharoor’s plea which seeks to protect his personality rights by preventing entities from misusing his personality without his consent.
This came on the heels of Tharoor’s lawyer, Amit Sibal, admitting that his client’s identity had been misused to create fake videos containing politically sensitive remarks, damaging his reputation.
He also told the court that although several fact checks have confirmed that the videos are fake, their continued circulation on social media platforms may lead people to believe they are real and may enable their misuse by foreign governments.
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Sibal also reported that the videos were earlier removed after complaints to the Center and Delhi’s DCP, but they have resurfaced through different URLs and can be accessed again on platforms like X, Facebook and Instagram.
He then urged the court to issue an order to remove the videos and prevent the entities from misusing his client’s personal attributes.
Meta’s lawyer confirmed that the videos on his platform had been removed earlier this morning, making the links inaccessible.
