Albany enters the fight: Three big AI bills filed in New York State Assembly
Image via Freepik
Lawmakers in New York entered the battle for transparency and security in AI recently with the filing of three significant bills authored by Assemblymember Alex Bores (D-Manhattan).
Bores has emerged as one of the leading lawmakers in the AI space in Albany, along with Assemblymember Clyde Vanel (D-Queens) and Sen. state Sen. Kristen Gonzalez (D-Queens, Manhattan, and Brooklyn), who also filed significant AI legislation recently.
Here’s what we’re watching at TCAI:
A6540: The Stop DeepFakes Act
Assemblymember Bores’ Stop Deepfakes Act is among the top priorities for the Transparency Coalition in New York. The proposal would require AI-generated or AI-altered images, videos, and other media to be embedded with a label listing their provenance data, which is data that records the origin or history of the digital content.
The label would act as a credential that discloses to users the origin of the content they’re consuming, along with its authenticity. The idea is that it’s easier to prove what is real material than it is to identify every AI-generated deepfake on the internet. It would also require the labeling of fake content created by AI, so users could identify it for what it is, along with identifying the AI system that generated it.
Bores’ bill would use the provenance labeling standard created by the Coalition for Content Provenance and Authenticity (CCPA) which is emerging as an industry standard that has been adopted by Adobe, Amazon, Google, Meta, Microsoft, and OpenAI.
The bill would also require social media platforms, including Facebook, Instagram, and others, to preserve the original provenance of any AI material uploaded to their sites.
Learn more about disclosure and provenance:
A6578: The AI Training Data Transparency Act
Assemblymember Bores also introduced the Artificial Intelligence Training Data Transparency Act, which requires AI developers to clearly post on their website information about the data they used to train the generative AI model or system.
The bill would require developers to include information about training data, including: the sources or owners of the data, descriptions of all data points, whether the datasets were purchased or licensed, and whether they contained personally identifiable information on consumers.
Learn more about training data:
A6453: The Responsible AI Safety and Education (RAISE) Act
Another bill Bores introduced earlier this month is the RAISE Act, which would implement a number of safety and security requirements before large AI developers could launch their platforms in New York State.
For example, AI developers would be required to create a written safety and security protocol and publish it and provide a copy to the state attorney general.
AI platforms would also have to conduct an annual review of any safety and security protocol needs that may have emerged and continually update their protocol policy.
It would also require large developers to retain a third-party auditor to review their compliance with the law on an annual basis, which must be posted conspicuously and submitted to the attorney general.
Large AI developers are defined in the bill as those which have spent $5 million or more on training an AI model, and that have spent more than $100 million on computing costs in aggregate.
Other noteworthy AI bills in New York:
We’re tracking three other AI-related bills in Albany this session:
A0222 and S5668: A proposed amendment to New York’s general business law that was introduced by Assemblyman Clyde Vanel (D-Queens). It would assign liability for AI-driven chatbots that are misleading, incorrect, contradictory or providing harmful information to a user when it results in financial loss or other demonstrable harm. State Sen. Kristen Gonzalez (D-Queens, Manhattan, and Brooklyn) Gonzalez proposed a companion bill in the state Senate.
A0768: The New York Artificial Intelligence Consumer Protection Act would ban AI algorithms from discriminating against protected classes. Assemblymember Bores introduced the proposal in the state Assembly, while Sen. Gonzalez introduced a companion in the Senate.
A3924: The Right to Know Your Own Image Act would guarantee the right to privacy when it comes to use of a portrait, picture, likeness or voice created or altered by digitization. Also introduced by Bores, it would also codify the right to take legal action in civil court in order to pursue an injunction and damages.
Stay up to date on these bills with our customized tracker below:
