US appeals court protects private possession of AI-generated child-abuse images
A US appeals court has upheld the dismissal of a possession charge against a Wisconsin man accused of creating and privately storing AI-generated images depicting child sexual abuse. Separate allegations involving production, distribution and sending images to a minor remain pending.
A Wisconsin man, Steven Anderegg, cannot be prosecuted for possessing AI-generated images of child sexual abuse because they were created without real children and kept privately, a US appeals court has ruled. The Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a lower court's decision to dismiss the possession charge against Anderegg, while leaving other criminal charges against him in place.
Anderegg allegedly used the AI model Stable Diffusion to generate thousands of realistic images of minors engaging in sexual acts. Authorities found evidence on his electronic devices showing he used specific, sexually explicit text prompts to create these images and communicated with a 15-year-old boy, sending him AI-generated images of minors.
The appeal focused solely on the possession charge, with the court ruling that the images did not involve real children, as established by US Supreme Court precedents. However, the judges expressed concerns about the increasing realism of AI-generated child sexual abuse images and acknowledged that further guidance from the Supreme Court may be necessary. The ruling applies only to the Seventh Circuit, which includes Illinois, Indiana, and Wisconsin.
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