Pennsylvania AI disclosure bill advances to state Senate
Pennsylvania House lawmakers on Wednesday approved a bill that would require businesses to notify consumers if they’ve used artificial intelligence to generate content.
The legislation, which now heads to the Pennsylvania Senate, would update the state’s Unfair Trade Practices and Consumer Protection Law of 1968, which prohibits the use of “deceptive, fraudulent, or unethical methods” to gain a business advantage or to cause harm to consumers. The update would amend the law to include “clear and conspicuous disclosure” when artificial intelligence is used to produce written text, images, audio or video.
The bill also specifies that notifications must be clearly displayed when the content is first seen by consumers.
“Pennsylvanians have the right to know if the content they are consuming was created by a human or if artificial intelligence was used to create it,” Rep. Chris Pielli, the bill’s prime sponsor, said in the bill’s memorandum. “This fabricated content could be used to scam or defraud Pennsylvanians.”
Opponents of the bill include Pennsylvania’s Chamber of Business and Industry, which argued that AI disclosures could leave businesses open to class-action lawsuits. Violators of the consumer protection law risk financial penalties which “may have been acquired” through the violation, as determined by a court of law.
If passed, Pennsylvania would join dozens of other states that have mandated public disclosure of generative AI use, though Pennsylvania’s bill doesn’t address the use of AI in creating materials intended to deceive an audience.
“This disclosure will give people who are reading or viewing this content the information they need to make informed decisions and not be misled,” Pielli said in the memo. “We cannot allow a future where people are unaware if they are interacting with a computer program or another person.”
The bill also includes a provision that prohibits defendants from arguing that child sexual abuse material produced by AI isn’t illegal.
