Taylor Swift deepfake pornography sparks renewed calls for US legislation

Fake but convincing explicit images of pop singer were viewed tens of millions of times on X and Telegram, prompting outcry from US politicians

The rapid online spread of deepfake pornographic images of Taylor Swift has renewed calls, including from US politicians, to criminalise the practice, in which artificial intelligence is used to synthesise fake but convincing explicit imagery.

The images of the US popstar have been distributed across social media and seen by millions this week. Previously distributed on the app Telegram, one of the images of Swift hosted on X was seen 47m times before it was removed.