
Why Are We Building Jailbait Sexbots? - bdehaaff
http://www.fastcolabs.com/3021651/why-are-we-building-jailbait-sexbots
======
greenyoda
In the U.S., operating a child sexbot would seem to be illegal under the
PROTECT Act, which prohibits "virtual child porn":

" _In the United States, the PROTECT Act of 2003 made significant changes to
the law regarding virtual child pornography. Any realistic appearing computer
generated depiction that is indistinguishable from a depiction of an actual
minor in sexual situations or engaging in sexual acts is illegal under 18
U.S.C. § 2252A._ "[1]

Maybe the government could get away with it, but if independent researchers
did it, they could be charged with producing child porn.

Yes, Orwell's "thoughtcrime" is an actual criminal offense in the U.S.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simulated_child_pornography#Vi...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simulated_child_pornography#Virtual_child_pornography)

~~~
eurleif
FWIW, simulated child porn laws aren't just about "thought crimes". They're
motivated by the fact that defendants in cases involving real child porn
sometimes claim the child porn is simulated, and it can be difficult and
expensive to prove that false.

~~~
tbrownaw
Which is why making _pictures_ illegal is rather screwy.

Make causing actual harm to an actual child illegal. Make profiting from it
(eg _selling_ pictures of said actual harm) illegal. Make _possessing_
pictures not illegal, but something that will get you asked where the pictures
came from.

.

But really it is about thoughtcrime. Society (or at least politicians) have
decided that having certain interests/desires is _wrong_ (or rather, that
those people are creepy and dangerous and can't possibly have the self-control
to not fully act on said thoughts). And so anything that may indicate someone
having said thoughts is made illegal, even if it doesn't hurt anyone, and even
if it indicate that they know not to act in harmful ways.

~~~
eurleif
>Make profiting from it (eg selling pictures of said actual harm) illegal.

Can't someone accused of selling child porn claim it's fake just as easily as
someone simply accused of possessing it?

~~~
tbrownaw
Sure, and the supposedly-stolen things I'm selling really just fell off the
back of a truck.

I would think that sellers having ties to producers would have a harder time
arguing they were selling fakes. And if they don't have those ties -- if
they're not supporting the people causing the harm -- then their actions are
only illegal for the sake of simplifying the prosecution's work. Which means
their likely being able to get off at trial is less of an issue.

------
zaroth
The problem is they are not soliciting a bot, they are soliciting children and
are going to lengths to ensure that they are getting what they are paying for.

If an MMORPG had "100 year old elvish" NPCs which had childlike features and
full nudity, then playing the game might be distasteful but probably should
fall under constitutional protection.

The law is very cognizant of intent and willfulness. If you willfully intend
to break the law, but fail to actually break the law, you can still be charged
and convicted of a crime. I don't have a problem with that.

I think you must agree that if you solicit a bot then there is no crime, just
like if you "murder" a bot there is no crime. Ultimately we have juries to
decide of the accused if full of shit claiming they were soliciting bots when
they were actually soliciting children. The burden of proof falls on the
Government to prove this beyond a reasonable doubt.

As bots get increasingly realistic and entertaining enough to create a market
for that service (regardless of the physical characteristic of the avatar) it
will be interesting to watch jurisprudence evolve.

A convincing avatar which can be synchronized with a human's text input,
and/or speech alteration (not text-to-speech) is one way you approach 'the
singularity' without having to synthesize human thoughts and emotions. Such a
system, if it can cross the uncanny valley, would radically improve quality of
live for millions of (and I hate this term) 'genetic lottery losers'.

~~~
dragonwriter
> If you willfully intend to break the law, but fail to actually break the
> law, you can still be charged and convicted of a crime.

No, you can't.

If you take concrete action in an _attempt_ to commit a crime, that is often
_itself_ a crime (usually a lesser offense than the one attempted; e.g.,
"attempted murder" is a distinct crime, and a lesser offense than murder.) But
if you are not proven to have broken the law (and, more specifically,
_committed a crime_ \-- not all lawbreaking is criminal), you cannot be
convicted of a crime.

~~~
jlgreco
Do attempted murder charges typically have a less extreme penalty than actual
murder charges? It is my impression that is the case, but I can't find much
that actually supports that notion.

This is a concern to me because it doesn't make sense to me that somebody who
tries to kill somebody but does a poor job of it should be punished less
harshly than somebody who tries to kill somebody and manages to pull it off.
Nobody should get off lighter just because their victim was particularly
hearty.

Of course on the opposite end of the spectrum, if I try to break the speed
limit with my beat up '65 Volkswagen beetle, but fail to do so, obviously I
don't deserve a speeding ticket. Attempted speeding isn't a crime, not all
"attempted [whatevers]" need to be punished.

~~~
dragonwriter
> Do attempted murder charges typically have a less extreme penalty than
> actual murder charges?

Yes.

> This is a concern to me because it doesn't make sense to me that somebody
> who tries to kill somebody but does a poor job of it should be punished less
> harshly than somebody who tries to kill somebody and manages to pull it off.

Typically, both the degree of "wrongness" of the act and the degree of harm
inflicted by it are factors in setting criminal punishments. While attempted
murder might be as morally wrong as actual murder, the harm inflicted is
different.

~~~
jlgreco
What if we view sentencing not as punishment or revenge, but rather as
something that we do for the safety of society?

It isn't clear to me that an attempted murderer is less dangerous to society
than a successful murderer _(unless we assume that all failed murder attempts
failed due to incompetence, but I don 't think that is safe to say)_, surely
they should both be kept off the streets for the same amount of time.

~~~
dragonwriter
> What if we view sentencing not as punishment or revenge, but rather as
> something that we do for the safety of society?

It could be argued that someone with both demonstrated bad intent and
demonstrated capacity is still more dangerous than someone with equally bad
intent that fails to demonstrate the capacity to successfully carry that
intent into fruition.

------
PeterisP
My personal position is that "soliciting" an "underage" sexbot should not ever
be a prosecutable crime, but that they can be used in the current way to
determine probable cause for warrants searching suspected pedophiles.

If there are actual human victims, then prosecute with all the harshness
possible; but if some pedophile gets off on 100% computer-generated images,
well, then that's probably a win for society that reduces violence and
exploitation.

~~~
DanBC
> but if some pedophile gets off on 100% computer-generated images, well, then
> that's probably a win for society that reduces violence and exploitation.

More research is needed. Some people suggest that users of pornography need to
collect more and more of it. Some people who collect images of child sexual
abuse are caught with hundreds of thousand of images.

A person collecting pseudo-photograph images of child sexual abuse _might_ be
a risk to children. (Data is tricky to find.)

But yes, if people can stay away from children and real images of child sexual
abuse then pseudo photographs would be great.

(I agree with you about the bots too.)

~~~
Anderkent
But surely without at least a reason to think virtual child porn causes child
abuse we should not make the act illegal?

~~~
DanBC
There is a reason to think that virtual images of child sexual abuse cause
real world child sexual abuse. People need more images, and there aren't
enough virtual images and so the collection is 'topped up' with real images.
And there's a possibility that people viewing images, even virtual, of child
sexual abuse will go on to abuse real world children.

Obviously it's very hard to test that, but it's at least credible.

The other point about pseudo-photographs is that it's a historical remainder
from times before we had photo-realistic rendering.

People would take real images of children, and manipulate those into images of
child sexual abuse. Sometimes combining real world children's heads onto real
world images of child sexual abuse, or images of adults having sex.

In that case two images are created from one instance of abuse. Two children
are shown, but only one has suffered abuse. Or children are shown, but adults
were used for the sexual parts of the photograph. Since people thought
strongly that possession of images of child sexual abuse was a signal that the
person would go on to commit actual abuse they made sure to make these images
illegal.

I find this very hard to talk about. I strongly want to protect children from
harm. Images of child sexual abuse cover a wide range of harm, from sexually
suggestive clothed posing of 15 year olds at one end to brutal rape of small
infants at the other. My instinct is to keep these images illegal, but I
realise that the demonisation of paedophiles does not help them seek help to
stop their offending behaviour, and drives them to "support groups" that
attempt to normalise their behaviour. And if we did proper research and found
that virtual images reduced real world offending it'd be hard to keep those
images illegal.

~~~
Anderkent
>There is a reason to think that virtual images of child sexual abuse cause
real world child sexual abuse. People need more images, and there aren't
enough virtual images and so the collection is 'topped up' with real images.
And there's a possibility that people viewing images, even virtual, of child
sexual abuse will go on to abuse real world children.

Or you could just as well argue that people use the imagery to fulfill their
needs, and if they didn't have that they'd turn to actual child abuse.

'credible' should not be good enough. (Of course in the current political
systems, it doesn't even have to be credible if you can spin it scarily
enough: see war on terror, war on drugs, sex offender registrations for
urinating in public etc.) You need evidence that actually supports your
theory.

~~~
DanBC
Show some research, do the work.

So far we have people who collect images of child sexual abuse, and some of
those people go on to abuse children more directly.

We don't have groups of people telling us that their collections of images of
child sexual abuse help prevent their offending behaviour. (For some obvious
reasons, of course.)

------
tn13
I think we should not worry about the criminals but we should worry more about
the victims. Objective should never be to put every sex offender behind bars
but the objective should be that no child should be a victim of such crimes.

Once we get that clear, putting all potential victims behind bars becomes one
of the way to have 0 victims. The question is how effective that method is and
whether it is achievable or can it backfire.

I would say that a bot that can detect a vulnerable child is far more
effective in preventing a crime than a one that detects a potential offender.

~~~
Spellman
You are primarily attacking the supply side of the equation. Locking up those
looking for this is working on the demand side. Both are valid means that
should be done in concert.

------
bmelton
The more (or less, who the hell knows) horrible aspect of this is that I
foresee a cottage industry springing up where "good enough" digital replicas
of children are used to provide sex services in the same way that phone sex
operators work now -- only, it'll be known (or at least assumed) that the
service is being provided by adults pretending to be children with digital
avatars, and the quality of the service will be measured by how convincingly
they portray their parts.

This will lead to all sorts of legal gray areas, wherein "I just assumed she
was digital" could well work as a positive defense, or, even more eerily, a
faux-pedophile service provider could staff enough adults to cover for the
non-adults that they sometimes use.

~~~
DanBC
The UK has some useful law around this.

For some offences it doesn't matter if you thought the person was a certain
age or not.

Compare this section:

Causing or inciting a child under 13 to engage in sexual activity
[http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2003/42/section/8](http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2003/42/section/8)

With this one:

Meeting a child following sexual grooming etc
[http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2003/42/section/15](http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2003/42/section/15)

See here, where they include both tests-

[http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2003/42/part/1/crosshead...](http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2003/42/part/1/crossheading/abuse-
of-children-through-prostitution-and-pornography)

> (i)B is under 18, and A does not reasonably believe that B is 18 or over, or

> (ii)B is under 13.

And there's stuff in the photography bit that means pseudo-photographs still
count as illegal.

~~~
bmelton
Interesting.

> And there's stuff in the photography bit that means pseudo-photographs still
> count as illegal.

That's where America differs. We expressly allow pseudo-imagery under the
first amendment. Logic being that the harm comes in the exploitation, but for
digital representations of images that are pornographic, nobody was exploited
in the process of their creation (at least, assuming nobody was exploited in
the process of their creation).

The UK laws though seem to both be more tangible than the situation discussed
in the article, at least assuming that 'sexual grooming' has been defined and
is fairly narrowly interpretable.

I'm not the person to say whether or not pretend pedo-porn is a net good or
evil for the world; but I can see arguments in either direction, but if
they're actually grooming children who they then meet, clearly, that's a net
bad.

Edit: I had it exactly backwards, and now I'm wondering how in the hell I
remember it so wrongly. Apparently we do _not_ condone digital representations
of child porn under the PROTECT Act of 2003[1].

I would swear I knew it the other way 'round.

[1] -
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simulated_child_pornography#Vi...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simulated_child_pornography#Virtual_child_pornography)

~~~
schoen
I think you were thinking of

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ashcroft_v._Free_Speech_Coalit...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ashcroft_v._Free_Speech_Coalition)

I'm not aware of whether the PROTECT Act (which I believe was a response to
this decision) has been challenged in court.

~~~
bmelton
Quite possibly. The only thing I can think of is that there was a potential
challenge to the PROTECT act, but cert was denied.

------
ThomPete
This is as disgusting as the crime its trying to rid us off.

Its modern-day witch hunt and completely skips over the fact that many sex-
offenders where in fact themselves victims when they were children.

Populism when its worst.

~~~
Pitarou
And I was bullied at school. That's why I spend my day browsing child-beating
websites.

But seriously, I have to disagree. I'm aware of the absurdities that arise
from populist demonisation of paedophiles. (E.g. the 17-year-old girl who
arrested for child porn because she sent a picture of her tits to her
boyfriend.) But I really think we should take steps to choke off the demand
for live images of child abuse.

~~~
ThomPete
Disagree away you are not taking any demands away from anything it will just
find other avenues and forums.

Just as in war on drugs.

~~~
Pitarou
I don't claim we can entirely eliminate it, but we can (and do) make it a
helluva lot harder than it might be if we took a _laissez faire_ attitude. I
think that has a real effect on children's lives.

------
inDigiNeous
Somewhere, in deep, dark, cold Russia, an army of Hackers is already building
an army of undetectable Pedophile Man Bots just to screw with these guys ..

Seriously though, wouldn't the creators be creating a virtual child designed
to encourage pedophilia ? So who would they be to judge ?

------
sciguy77
Wow I would be really uncomfortable working on that project.

------
skizm
I wonder if websites that show exclusively CGI generated underage porn will be
illegal or not. Seems like if it isn't hurting anyone then who cares.

~~~
diminoten
In the US it's illegal, as per a comment directly under the submission.

~~~
skizm
I think the first comment says you have to purposefully be trying to break the
law. If you went into a situation where you knew what you were seeing was a
bot and not a person then I don't think that would count as attempting to
break any laws. Or am I misreading that?

~~~
diminoten
"In the United States, the PROTECT Act of 2003 made significant changes to the
law regarding virtual child pornography. Any realistic appearing computer
generated depiction that is indistinguishable from a depiction of an actual
minor in sexual situations or engaging in sexual acts is illegal under 18
U.S.C. § 2252A."

That's the part I'm talking about.

~~~
skizm
Gotcha, yea pretty cut and dry. I don't agree with that law but that's another
issue I guess.

------
nilved
There isn't any question or moral ambiguity here. Replace the code with an
undercover cop and re-try the thought experiment.

~~~
kinghajj
While in both scenarios a crime is technically committed (I would guess
something like "using a computer with the intent of accessing/distributing
child pornography,") can't you appreciate how it bothers some to think that
one could be convicted without any victim? Lets use a computer analogy: what
if I put up a server running running an SSH-like service that would present a
false shell and allow commands to be entered, and even give reasonable-yet-
bogus responses, and I put up the username/password information on a pastebin
and post it everywhere. Should anyone who connects to it and attempts to run
"rm -rf /" be convicted of a crime for intended to destroy computer data, even
when their action actually has no effect?

~~~
joosters
Crime is a combination of intentions, actions and results. Just because no-one
is harmed doesn't mean there's no crime. If I try and murder someone and fail
(perhaps I'm a poor shot?) then I'm hardly an innocent.

I'd recommend the webcomic 'The illustrated guide to law' to everyone,
especially many of the commentators on here. It is disturbing to read some of
these posts.

[http://lawcomic.net/guide/?p=173](http://lawcomic.net/guide/?p=173)

~~~
tptacek
Seconding this recommendation; the whole series is lengthy and consistently
pretty great.

------
eldude
Here's a philosophical question, as technology progresses to the point that
virtual reality is so good that it is able to replace real children in cases
like these and satisfy child predators thus eliminating victims is this a
fundamentally morally good thing?

------
salgernon
It occurs to me that they would be better off building filthy old man bot so
as to catch the producer side of the equation.

------
X4
unbelievable interesting. I'm working on studies of human behaviour in various
channels, including darknets like those. I am curious how psychological
manipulation can be used to subconsciously counter this, the CG-Sexbot was the
missing piece.

------
Raphmedia
Those are doing a lot of damage if you ask me. Real kids are not that "open"
to have cyber-sex with strangers.

By making fake jailbaits, you are baiting adults into... cyber sex with kids!
"Hey, the kids love it! Let's keep going!"

This is not a solution.

~~~
FBT
One of the major problems with law enforcement today is that so long as they
carefully skirt the edges of what is legally defined as "entrapment", they can
bait people into crimes, and arrest them for it even if otherwise they would
not have committed any crime at all.

This really isn't good, and that's what the anti-entrapment statutes are for,
but law enforcement finds its way around them... That's one of the best ways
to catch "criminals", and catching criminals is their job, right?

~~~
chc
Surely you don't think having a bot introduce itself as a 10-year-old Filipina
counters as entrapment. That's not even skirting the line — based on what
they've shown, the bot is not the one that brings up sex.

------
volune
To put more people in jail. It is the American way.

------
siegecraft
Seems like a slippery slope that ends in people getting arrested for murder
because they play GTA.

------
chris_mahan
asl?

