WEBVTT - 'My Son Wasn't There Alone' 0:00:00.120 --> 0:00:03.920 A quick note before we start that this series explores 0:00:04.080 --> 0:00:17.319 sexualized imagery involving miners and violence. Please take care when listening. Hey, 0:00:17.720 --> 0:00:21.560 I'm Olivia Carvill and I'm Maggie Murphy. We're the hosts 0:00:21.640 --> 0:00:26.320 of Levettown, a podcast series that explored the explosion of 0:00:26.440 --> 0:00:30.600 deep fake pornography in US high schools, and we're back 0:00:30.640 --> 0:00:34.800 in the studio for an update episode. We're here to 0:00:34.880 --> 0:00:38.520 tell you about a long awaited crackdown on deep fake 0:00:38.640 --> 0:00:42.400 pawn and to hear from parents who have dealt with 0:00:42.440 --> 0:00:47.280 this kind of cyber harassment firsthand. One is the mother 0:00:47.440 --> 0:00:51.559 of a victim, the other is the mother of a perpetrator. 0:00:52.800 --> 0:00:54.120 But first the news. 0:00:54.640 --> 0:00:58.040 The President sat to sign the bipartisan Take It Down 0:00:58.240 --> 0:01:02.240 at which would help combat, say actually explosit online materials 0:01:02.240 --> 0:01:03.920 sometimes generated by ai. 0:01:04.920 --> 0:01:09.400 US lawmakers have passed the Take It Down Act, the 0:01:09.440 --> 0:01:13.679 first federal legislation to lay out away for teens and 0:01:13.840 --> 0:01:19.000 young women to get non consensual pornography scrubbed of social media. 0:01:19.520 --> 0:01:26.160 The legislation also criminalizes publishing, or even threatening to publish 0:01:26.520 --> 0:01:30.679 revenge porn or deep fake images. Today, it's my honor 0:01:30.720 --> 0:01:33.440 to officially sign the Take It Down Act into law, 0:01:33.680 --> 0:01:36.280 this big thing, very important, so horrible. 0:01:36.720 --> 0:01:39.280 If you've already listened to the series, you'll know that 0:01:39.319 --> 0:01:42.160 things played out in Levittown the way they did largely 0:01:42.240 --> 0:01:44.319 because there was no law on the books at the 0:01:44.360 --> 0:01:47.520 state or federal level to address deep fake porn. The 0:01:47.600 --> 0:01:50.720 new federal law has its fans and its critics, and 0:01:50.760 --> 0:01:53.320 if you want to hear more about specifically what's in it, 0:01:53.480 --> 0:01:57.040 you can listen to a previous episode. But this episode, 0:01:57.120 --> 0:01:59.200 we're going to hear from a parent whose daughter was 0:01:59.240 --> 0:02:03.000 involved in wishing for this legislation after deep faked images 0:02:03.040 --> 0:02:05.800 of her were shared at her school. And we're also 0:02:05.920 --> 0:02:08.880 going to hear from another parent, one whose child has 0:02:08.919 --> 0:02:12.239 been on the opposite side of this harassment and who 0:02:12.280 --> 0:02:17.920 has harmed others. It's every parent's nightmare to think that 0:02:17.960 --> 0:02:20.360 their child could be a victim of deep fake pornography, 0:02:21.120 --> 0:02:25.840 of a long, intimidating campaign of cyber harassment. But what 0:02:25.880 --> 0:02:28.240 if you learned that your child was a perpetrator of 0:02:28.280 --> 0:02:31.200 a crime like this, That the child you nurtured and 0:02:31.280 --> 0:02:35.400 cared for not only created non consensual pornographic images of 0:02:35.440 --> 0:02:38.880 girls they knew from school, but they continue to harass 0:02:38.960 --> 0:02:42.560 them over the course of several years, all while hiding 0:02:42.560 --> 0:02:50.040 their identity online. What if you found out this was 0:02:50.080 --> 0:02:52.840 happening only when the police knocked on your door with 0:02:52.880 --> 0:02:53.720 a search warrant. 0:02:54.000 --> 0:02:56.280 I hid a glimpse of something that was absolutely horrible. 0:02:56.480 --> 0:02:59.160 In if it wasn't for the fake my son was involved, 0:02:59.200 --> 0:03:02.000 I still wouldn't even know about it. And parents need 0:03:02.040 --> 0:03:04.079 to know. You know, this needs to get sorted out. 0:03:04.320 --> 0:03:06.320 This is the mother of a young man who was 0:03:06.360 --> 0:03:09.160 accused of the kind of online harassment we covered in 0:03:09.200 --> 0:03:12.760 our series. She wanted to remain anonymous because she feared 0:03:12.800 --> 0:03:17.079 speaking out publicly could impact her career in safety. So 0:03:17.280 --> 0:03:20.720 we've agreed not to identify her or her son and 0:03:20.760 --> 0:03:24.480 will refer to her using a pseudonym, Barbara. She went 0:03:24.520 --> 0:03:27.200 through a lot with her son, and she said she 0:03:27.280 --> 0:03:31.560 thought it might help others to hear about it. Barbara 0:03:31.600 --> 0:03:34.160 says that when her son was young, she thought that 0:03:34.200 --> 0:03:36.200 she was lucky to have a happy child who was 0:03:36.320 --> 0:03:38.880 pretty adaptable pre puberty. 0:03:39.720 --> 0:03:43.760 He was literally an all round it really he loved 0:03:43.920 --> 0:03:46.520 a lot of different things. He had a lot of 0:03:46.560 --> 0:03:51.960 my characteristics, so we related. Well, he's quite creative, it 0:03:52.040 --> 0:03:56.680 was extremely companionable, just a lovely young boy. 0:03:57.640 --> 0:03:59.760 But over time things changed. 0:04:00.920 --> 0:04:05.400 He developed some mental health issues as he approached puberty, 0:04:06.240 --> 0:04:09.280 and was quite a dramatic change, very very sudden. 0:04:09.760 --> 0:04:13.240 She noticed her son pulling away from sports, school and 0:04:13.320 --> 0:04:17.000 his social life. To her, something knocked him off course, 0:04:17.560 --> 0:04:19.440 effectively driving him into isolation. 0:04:20.200 --> 0:04:23.840 The serious social withdrawal started to kick in and of 0:04:23.920 --> 0:04:25.200 his depression, and. 0:04:26.120 --> 0:04:27.080 That was difficult. 0:04:27.400 --> 0:04:30.359 So it went from a child who was participating in 0:04:30.440 --> 0:04:34.480 things to a teenager who refused to participate in It 0:04:34.520 --> 0:04:38.200 was like black and white. And started to have some 0:04:38.320 --> 0:04:41.360 negative comments about school as well, about his teachers or 0:04:41.360 --> 0:04:45.279 about not enjoying subjects. It can't be bothered. Also, a 0:04:45.480 --> 0:04:48.560 thing that I had noticed with him was that, unlike 0:04:49.560 --> 0:04:53.679 kids of my friends, he had no vision of his future. 0:04:53.960 --> 0:04:57.080 And I saw this teenager who refused to take any 0:04:57.200 --> 0:05:03.640 opportunities and had no vision of what he wanted to do. 0:05:04.080 --> 0:05:07.279 So there was, you know, so started to get quite worried. 0:05:08.320 --> 0:05:10.919 I was concerned enough about it even then that I 0:05:11.000 --> 0:05:13.920 did talk to a counselor was there anything I could do. 0:05:15.200 --> 0:05:18.600 I remember being told that because I was an awesome mother, 0:05:18.720 --> 0:05:20.960 I was a great role model and I didn't have 0:05:21.040 --> 0:05:23.760 to worry about anything. It is really one of the 0:05:23.800 --> 0:05:28.120 things that sticks in my throat. It's clearly things went 0:05:28.160 --> 0:05:31.400 pretty pear shaped, and I'm not going to go into 0:05:31.400 --> 0:05:35.880 the details because so I think mental health and mental illness, 0:05:37.240 --> 0:05:38.960 they don't come and neat little boxes. 0:05:39.120 --> 0:05:43.200 Anyway, Barbara was a pretty tech savvy mum, and there 0:05:43.200 --> 0:05:46.520 were always computers in their home. She didn't think much 0:05:46.600 --> 0:05:50.119 of her son using technology too, like playing Harry Potter 0:05:50.240 --> 0:05:54.560 video games, but as he got older, she noticed he 0:05:54.600 --> 0:05:58.880 spent more time online and he began making friends there too. 0:06:00.520 --> 0:06:03.520 In hindsight, there were some influences that started to come 0:06:03.560 --> 0:06:07.239 into the house. I will describe it in general terms. 0:06:07.800 --> 0:06:10.800 So if you're a parent and you've got a son 0:06:11.000 --> 0:06:14.359 and they're having a sex life in their bedrooms, locked 0:06:14.440 --> 0:06:19.279 up with the curtains drawn, and that you can't not 0:06:19.520 --> 0:06:23.120 know that's happening. There's signs of that. So that had 0:06:23.120 --> 0:06:25.080 been going on for a long time. But I thought 0:06:25.080 --> 0:06:30.280 it was consensual, you know, modern online relationships, because he 0:06:30.480 --> 0:06:33.320 told me by that time about real relationships that he 0:06:33.400 --> 0:06:36.160 believed were real. So I was aware that he was 0:06:36.200 --> 0:06:40.279 having an online thing. So though I wasn't expecting this 0:06:40.520 --> 0:06:43.280 other aspect, but I had warned him about things that 0:06:43.320 --> 0:06:46.760 can happen online. You know, these are things you need 0:06:46.800 --> 0:06:50.680 to be really careful about because people can get groomed 0:06:50.720 --> 0:06:54.359 and sucked into, you know stuff. You know. I tried 0:06:54.400 --> 0:06:59.160 to explain to him seriously, and he's just like, fuck 0:06:59.760 --> 0:07:03.159 you go away, Mom. What do you know? 0:07:04.200 --> 0:07:06.400 Can you recall the moment when you learned that your 0:07:06.400 --> 0:07:09.680 son was harassing women online with doctored graphic images. 0:07:10.720 --> 0:07:13.320 A bunch of investigators and police turned up with a 0:07:13.360 --> 0:07:17.400 search warrant. It was might have been a week end 0:07:17.480 --> 0:07:19.800 or after work. I was outside cleaning up with a 0:07:19.840 --> 0:07:22.840 wheelbarrow in a rake or something like that. I locked 0:07:22.920 --> 0:07:26.480 up on it. It's just this array of police and 0:07:26.520 --> 0:07:30.200 playing clothes investigators at my gate, and a female detective 0:07:30.240 --> 0:07:32.880 came to speak to me, show me that there was 0:07:32.920 --> 0:07:33.720 a search warrant. 0:07:34.080 --> 0:07:34.560 Ah. 0:07:34.720 --> 0:07:38.560 They asked if he lived here, where was he in 0:07:38.600 --> 0:07:42.720 the house. So I guess I was shocked, but I 0:07:42.880 --> 0:07:47.600 wasn't one hundred percent surprised, because I'd been really concerned 0:07:47.600 --> 0:07:51.000 about my son with the illness, and because I knew 0:07:51.040 --> 0:07:53.400 that I didn't know what he was doing. 0:07:54.240 --> 0:07:56.800 Can you characterize what you were told that he had 0:07:56.840 --> 0:07:59.200 been doing? Why the police were investigating him. 0:08:00.120 --> 0:08:02.680 That came in with a warrant and some babework. They 0:08:02.760 --> 0:08:05.560 left it on the bench top. I just read the 0:08:05.600 --> 0:08:10.120 front page had some charges on it, and I remember 0:08:10.240 --> 0:08:13.400 its like I think a lot of it was like 0:08:13.720 --> 0:08:25.320 online harm. Later, because he was having difficulty dealing with 0:08:25.360 --> 0:08:29.840 the lawyers. The lawyers are having difficulty because it's a 0:08:29.880 --> 0:08:34.760 new area. I thought, well, I'm going to have to 0:08:34.800 --> 0:08:36.719 have a closer look here, and I'm going to have 0:08:36.760 --> 0:08:40.600 to help. The lawyer had a massive file, and then 0:08:40.679 --> 0:08:43.520 I saw all the stuff. 0:08:45.480 --> 0:08:48.160 All Barbara knew were the charges brought against her son. 0:08:49.440 --> 0:08:51.600 He wasn't willing to talk then about what he'd been 0:08:51.640 --> 0:08:54.400 accused of. We asked if he would be open to 0:08:54.400 --> 0:08:57.680 speaking to us, and he declined. But looking at the 0:08:57.720 --> 0:09:01.880 online images the investigators had collected, this was the moment 0:09:01.880 --> 0:09:03.960 that Barbara realized what her son had been up to 0:09:05.320 --> 0:09:12.640 alone in his bedroom. 0:09:12.800 --> 0:09:13.640 We'll be right back. 0:09:15.480 --> 0:09:18.520 We're back with Barbara, who's taking her first look at 0:09:18.559 --> 0:09:21.200 the images that showed her what her son was doing online. 0:09:21.920 --> 0:09:26.760 And there was all these men, all these dick pictures 0:09:26.800 --> 0:09:32.640 were just like erect Penis's water War. Guys taking photos 0:09:32.679 --> 0:09:36.760 of themselves in front of their computer and then interacting 0:09:36.840 --> 0:09:41.240 somehow and this begang of other men and then they 0:09:41.559 --> 0:09:45.960 were talking just disgusting things about what they wanted to 0:09:46.000 --> 0:09:51.280 do to various females. Honestly, I had no clues that 0:09:51.320 --> 0:09:55.520 there was these kind of porn sits. To me, it 0:09:55.559 --> 0:09:58.679 seemed like a virtual, kind of a gang rate scenario. 0:09:58.920 --> 0:10:02.760 That's how a me imediately perceived it. Oh, my son 0:10:02.840 --> 0:10:05.880 has been groomed into this stuff for the lese like 0:10:06.640 --> 0:10:10.520 guys in their thirties forties. Not just young boys. These 0:10:10.559 --> 0:10:14.480 are adult men out there saying hey, you know you're 0:10:14.520 --> 0:10:15.280 one of us. 0:10:16.160 --> 0:10:19.319 As Olivia and I learned through our reporting, there are 0:10:19.360 --> 0:10:23.199 many places for non consensual pornographers to post their creations, 0:10:24.040 --> 0:10:26.800 places where they get a boost from likes and comments 0:10:26.840 --> 0:10:27.559 from other men. 0:10:28.559 --> 0:10:31.320 Tell us what you'd like to do to this woman, 0:10:31.480 --> 0:10:35.520 or show us a woman that we can make comments about, 0:10:36.080 --> 0:10:40.600 or whatever. Post pictures of you. You know, you're Jenna 0:10:40.640 --> 0:10:44.920 Talior on the computer, and I what the hell? It's 0:10:45.200 --> 0:10:50.480 never been something that my generation. It's just like it's 0:10:50.520 --> 0:10:52.760 just completely wouldn't even imagine it. 0:10:53.400 --> 0:10:55.800 Barbara says she hates when she hears the police talk 0:10:55.880 --> 0:10:59.560 about lone wolves committing these kinds of crimes. It bothers 0:10:59.559 --> 0:11:04.079 her when people suggest that the perpetrators are introverted acting alone, 0:11:04.760 --> 0:11:06.480 because that's not how she sees it. 0:11:07.000 --> 0:11:10.040 That's a gang activity. My son wasn't there alone. He 0:11:10.200 --> 0:11:15.680 was getting pumped up by mass testosterone, fueled by thousands 0:11:15.720 --> 0:11:18.920 of men around the world telling him he was the greatest. 0:11:19.080 --> 0:11:21.960 It's not just one fifteen year old inventing all of us. 0:11:22.679 --> 0:11:25.400 She knows all about this world now, but it's not 0:11:25.440 --> 0:11:28.560 something she was aware of before her son's arrest. And 0:11:28.600 --> 0:11:31.360 she's frustrated that the people she hired to help her 0:11:31.400 --> 0:11:34.199 son didn't flag this as a possible issue. 0:11:34.640 --> 0:11:40.400 And I've just been through years of talking to psychologists, psychiatrists. 0:11:40.440 --> 0:11:44.079 My son's been assessed and reassessed and reassessed and reassessed 0:11:44.559 --> 0:11:49.000 for years. Why didn't it come up? So I have 0:11:49.040 --> 0:11:52.439 a lot of questions about it, a lot of questions 0:11:51.800 --> 0:11:55.560 about those unknown harms. 0:11:56.640 --> 0:11:59.200 You know, has your son been willing to talk to 0:11:59.240 --> 0:12:01.120 you about what he was accused of? 0:12:01.800 --> 0:12:05.160 Largely No. At the start, he just denied everything, just 0:12:05.160 --> 0:12:08.520 denied everything for a long time. And that's when I 0:12:08.559 --> 0:12:11.240 realized the extend of the problem. I suppose before that 0:12:11.360 --> 0:12:13.960 I really trusted him. I thought we had a good relationship, 0:12:15.040 --> 0:12:20.800 and so I went through a period of feeling utterly 0:12:20.840 --> 0:12:27.600 betrayed and heartbroken basically for quite some time. It's irrepearable 0:12:27.720 --> 0:12:32.320 because this goes against my entire values, you know, values, 0:12:32.360 --> 0:12:36.520 everything that I've lived in my life to support women, 0:12:36.800 --> 0:12:41.240 encourage women, back women, and stand up to bullying and 0:12:41.240 --> 0:12:43.120 all that kind of thing. I just saw this as 0:12:43.160 --> 0:12:46.360 such some horrible monster that had come into my house 0:12:47.320 --> 0:12:48.559 without my permission. 0:12:49.400 --> 0:12:52.520 But Barbara says over time she started to look at 0:12:52.559 --> 0:12:54.360 the situation differently. 0:12:54.720 --> 0:12:58.040 And then I started to see him not as a criminal, 0:12:58.080 --> 0:13:03.000 but as a very vulnerable lesson, really struggling with his identity, 0:13:03.080 --> 0:13:05.959 with his social life, with his sexual development and stuff, 0:13:06.840 --> 0:13:10.880 and being just fucked into this because he didn't, you know, 0:13:10.960 --> 0:13:14.000 because of the state of his mind. Basically he was 0:13:14.160 --> 0:13:17.800 very vulnerable to it. I told my son this recently. 0:13:18.880 --> 0:13:22.679 This is a problem of male behavior, and it must 0:13:22.760 --> 0:13:27.360 be solved by men. Women aren't going to solve this problem. Mums, 0:13:27.559 --> 0:13:32.120 Angry mums aren't going to solve the problem men that 0:13:32.240 --> 0:13:34.960 have been through it. They're going to have to figure 0:13:34.960 --> 0:13:38.400 out how they got into it. Look at the damage 0:13:38.400 --> 0:13:41.760 its cause to others and to themselves, and then they're 0:13:41.760 --> 0:13:43.719 going to have to figure out a solution. I think 0:13:43.720 --> 0:13:47.160 that's the only way that that harm can be addressed. 0:13:47.160 --> 0:13:50.600 Really. I know you've spoken about him being up in 0:13:50.640 --> 0:13:55.760 his room and the vacuum that these groups failed for 0:13:56.160 --> 0:13:59.120 fear sung, but are there any other warding signs that 0:13:59.200 --> 0:14:01.800 you might tell parents to look out for. 0:14:02.520 --> 0:14:06.199 Yeah, I wrote down a list of them. So a 0:14:06.280 --> 0:14:09.040 lack of friends in the real world, the amount of 0:14:09.080 --> 0:14:12.880 time spent online, that it is an all consuming, all 0:14:12.960 --> 0:14:17.720 consuming thing, pulling the curtains in shades, locking the door 0:14:18.440 --> 0:14:22.880 as a routine procedure to set themselves up for maximum privacy, 0:14:23.240 --> 0:14:27.880 having a printer installed in the bedroom suddenly when maybe 0:14:27.920 --> 0:14:30.800 they don't need it for work. There could be like 0:14:30.960 --> 0:14:35.520 little tiny things on their own as a one off. 0:14:36.000 --> 0:14:38.600 You might not think anything of them, but I think 0:14:38.640 --> 0:14:45.240 it's like scigns of addiction that that world becomes more 0:14:45.280 --> 0:14:48.800 real to them, so it affects their relationships in the home. 0:14:48.880 --> 0:14:52.000 They start to be rude, not listening to other people, 0:14:53.120 --> 0:14:57.360 that aggression that sort of like almost a hostility. Don't 0:14:57.400 --> 0:14:58.560 come near my world. 0:14:59.320 --> 0:15:04.840 With the evolution of technology at the moment, we're just 0:15:04.880 --> 0:15:10.160 seeing such an advance in what's available. Even since the 0:15:10.280 --> 0:15:14.280 experience that you've described, technology has moved incredibly quickly, and 0:15:15.520 --> 0:15:20.280 images that these men in these networks were using and 0:15:20.360 --> 0:15:24.720 taking hours to alter now takes minutes. And there's newdify 0:15:24.800 --> 0:15:28.840 apps that produce fake moods and moments. Can you imagine 0:15:28.880 --> 0:15:34.040 your son scenario but with today's technological ease of creating 0:15:34.080 --> 0:15:37.120 that fake porn? How do you think that would have 0:15:37.160 --> 0:15:43.280 played out? And also how troubling do you think that 0:15:43.360 --> 0:15:46.640 this technology is just so easily available to young men 0:15:46.720 --> 0:15:48.080 all around the world right now? 0:15:48.960 --> 0:15:54.440 So I think either these sites need to not exist, 0:15:54.640 --> 0:15:58.600 or if they do exist, so we need to restrict excess. 0:15:58.680 --> 0:16:01.160 And I think parents have to be able to do that. 0:16:01.440 --> 0:16:05.640 In at the moment, you can't because there's this whole 0:16:05.720 --> 0:16:10.200 kind of ethos about, oh, we're training and teaching our 0:16:10.240 --> 0:16:13.200 young people to make good choices, and so you should 0:16:13.240 --> 0:16:16.760 stand back and let them make good choices. I just 0:16:16.800 --> 0:16:23.600 think that's utter rubbish because they can't. They have no idea, 0:16:23.880 --> 0:16:26.680 and they don't listen to the appearance or to anybody, 0:16:26.800 --> 0:16:30.160 So you're not going to make good choices. We can't 0:16:30.160 --> 0:16:33.880 just step back because too many of them are falling 0:16:33.880 --> 0:16:35.520 into this abyss. 0:16:36.480 --> 0:16:41.080 It's interesting you talk about restrictions because there's a real 0:16:41.200 --> 0:16:44.160 range of parenting philosophy over how to protect young people 0:16:44.200 --> 0:16:47.880 from dangers online. And on one side you have parents 0:16:47.920 --> 0:16:52.240 who advocate for withholding devices completely. Then you've got others 0:16:52.280 --> 0:16:56.280 who are making rules like okay in communal areas the 0:16:56.320 --> 0:16:59.400 living room, but not the bedroom. And then on the 0:16:59.400 --> 0:17:03.760 other end have parents who say tech is going to 0:17:03.800 --> 0:17:06.960 be here forever. Now, you can't stop children from using it, 0:17:07.520 --> 0:17:09.840 but what we can do is just talk to them 0:17:09.880 --> 0:17:14.120 about it. Where do you come down in that spectrum? 0:17:14.880 --> 0:17:18.320 I definitely like just having a rule around those bedrooms. 0:17:18.480 --> 0:17:22.240 Do not allow teenagers to set up their bedrooms as 0:17:22.280 --> 0:17:25.520 a fortress where no one can see in, no one 0:17:25.560 --> 0:17:29.320 can come in, and they sort of develop an arrogant 0:17:29.359 --> 0:17:31.919 attitude of saying that their parents don't even have the 0:17:32.000 --> 0:17:35.480 right to know what's happening in there. I think that's 0:17:35.480 --> 0:17:38.080 a real danger zone. To me, that is one thing 0:17:38.080 --> 0:17:41.560 that I could have actually controlled that better, but I 0:17:41.600 --> 0:17:45.000 would have had to fight about It wouldn't have been easy. 0:17:45.320 --> 0:17:48.560 So I think parents are going to have to be 0:17:49.280 --> 0:17:51.560 very strong about about this, and there's going to be 0:17:51.600 --> 0:17:54.159 a lot of pushback, so I don't think there's going 0:17:54.200 --> 0:17:56.919 to be I don't have any hope that there's going 0:17:57.000 --> 0:18:02.000 to be a quick or fast fix for it. I 0:18:02.040 --> 0:18:04.359 think we have to really raise awareness at the moment, 0:18:04.960 --> 0:18:08.280 really really raise awareness to a lot of parents, to 0:18:08.359 --> 0:18:12.160 a lot of community leaders, and anyone involved in supporting 0:18:12.240 --> 0:18:14.760 youth in any way. 0:18:15.600 --> 0:18:21.000 Great, Well, it's so appreciate you being so candid and 0:18:21.040 --> 0:18:24.240 sharing that, and I think a lot of people will 0:18:24.240 --> 0:18:27.720 find it incredibly enlightening and helpful. 0:18:28.560 --> 0:18:34.720 So thank you from me as well. I really am 0:18:34.760 --> 0:18:39.080 so happy, i will burst into tears. So you know, 0:18:40.240 --> 0:18:43.399 I've had the world on my shoulders with dealing with this, 0:18:43.840 --> 0:18:47.720 and you know, I'm extremely grateful to take this opportunity 0:18:47.880 --> 0:18:50.199 to tell it how it is because I think it's 0:18:50.240 --> 0:18:52.200 such a problem. 0:18:52.240 --> 0:18:58.560 After the break, obviously, the second step after calling the school, 0:18:58.560 --> 0:19:01.200 it's calling your lawyer to find out, you know, whither 0:19:01.200 --> 0:19:05.000 are your rates? So we've been informed or no regulations, 0:19:05.040 --> 0:19:08.720 no legislation globally at that point. So as soon as 0:19:08.720 --> 0:19:12.080 Francisca came back the day off, she told me, Mom, 0:19:12.080 --> 0:19:14.520 I want a law I need you to help me 0:19:14.720 --> 0:19:16.400 to find a law. 0:19:24.800 --> 0:19:28.800 Of course, parents of young women have also been struggling, 0:19:29.880 --> 0:19:33.440 struggling to figure out how to prevent their daughters from 0:19:33.600 --> 0:19:38.520 falling victim to deep fake pornography and struggling with how 0:19:38.560 --> 0:19:42.560 to adequately protect them from the dangers of the digital world. 0:19:43.560 --> 0:19:47.720 We spoke to one mother, Derota Manny, from New Jersey, 0:19:48.200 --> 0:19:50.960 whose daughter was deep fated while she was a fourteen 0:19:51.000 --> 0:19:55.320 year old at Westfield High School, and she decided to 0:19:55.440 --> 0:19:56.080 fight back. 0:19:57.200 --> 0:20:00.720 Francesca has been confirmed to be one of many AA 0:20:00.840 --> 0:20:03.919 victims of deep fake pornography at Westfield High School in 0:20:03.960 --> 0:20:06.960 New Jersey, and ever since we have been advocating for 0:20:07.119 --> 0:20:11.120 regulation and legislation and just AI authority in general. 0:20:11.760 --> 0:20:15.160 De Rooda Manny and her daughter were just in Washington, 0:20:15.240 --> 0:20:19.280 DC in the Rose Garden of the White House where 0:20:19.320 --> 0:20:23.159 President Donald Trump signed the Take It Down Act. 0:20:23.560 --> 0:20:26.720 With us are several other brave Americans whose lives were 0:20:26.800 --> 0:20:30.720 rocked by online harassment, including Francesca Manny. 0:20:31.560 --> 0:20:36.159 De Oda Manny describes herself as an entrepreneur, an educator, 0:20:36.800 --> 0:20:42.120 and now an advocate for deep fake pawn survivors. What 0:20:42.200 --> 0:20:46.320 she's not, she says, is someone who was ever looking 0:20:46.440 --> 0:20:48.760 to get tangled up in politics. 0:20:49.119 --> 0:20:54.639 We live very comfortable life, surrounded by two dogs, two cards. 0:20:54.800 --> 0:20:57.760 We go for walks, we travel a lot, we hike, 0:20:57.880 --> 0:21:01.280 we kayak. We don't need to be in CNN, or 0:21:01.320 --> 0:21:04.960 in New York Times or god knows where else. This 0:21:05.119 --> 0:21:08.719 is not our prerogative, So that spitlight was put on 0:21:08.840 --> 0:21:12.520 us without our consent and without our knowledge. 0:21:12.880 --> 0:21:17.639 Deeroda says that in October twenty twenty three, when Francisca 0:21:17.800 --> 0:21:21.640 was a sophomore, she learned that deep fake porn images 0:21:21.680 --> 0:21:26.320 of her were being sheered among her male classmates on Snapchat. 0:21:27.080 --> 0:21:30.520 Francisca was one of several girls at her school who 0:21:30.560 --> 0:21:34.760 were targeted. At first, Deoda says this came as a 0:21:34.800 --> 0:21:39.320 shock for her daughter, but that quickly turned to anger. 0:21:40.200 --> 0:21:44.480 So, you know, immediately when she found out, she texted me, 0:21:45.160 --> 0:21:48.439 then she called me, and I know everybody expected she 0:21:48.480 --> 0:21:51.600 would be crying. No, she was just shocked. Multiple of 0:21:51.640 --> 0:21:54.040 girls crying on the hallways. I mean, it was a 0:21:54.080 --> 0:21:57.280 havoc during that time in the high school, and some 0:21:57.520 --> 0:22:00.359 boys were pointing at them and making fun of and 0:22:00.400 --> 0:22:02.879 that's when she stopped and she said, you know, I 0:22:02.880 --> 0:22:05.960 shouldn't be crying. I should be mad. There's nothing to 0:22:06.000 --> 0:22:08.880 be said about. I should be mad about what has 0:22:08.920 --> 0:22:10.040 happened to us girls. 0:22:10.800 --> 0:22:14.280 De Roda was mad too, once she fully understood the 0:22:14.320 --> 0:22:18.040 gravity of what had happened when she answered that first 0:22:18.080 --> 0:22:22.000 call from her daughter that day. She'd heard about deep fakes, 0:22:22.760 --> 0:22:27.600 but only in the political realm. She knew that sometimes CEOs, 0:22:28.080 --> 0:22:33.159 lawmakers or celebrities had been targeted, but high school girls 0:22:33.520 --> 0:22:37.680 being undressed with AI never And. 0:22:37.600 --> 0:22:39.440 When I said, can you please explain it to me? 0:22:39.520 --> 0:22:42.560 What does that mean? She said, Well, there's a technology 0:22:42.560 --> 0:22:44.600 when you can just undress girls, so you can take 0:22:44.640 --> 0:22:48.399 any picture, and with a click of a button, sometimes free, 0:22:48.440 --> 0:22:51.360 sometimes for nine niner cents, sometimes for five dollars, depending 0:22:51.400 --> 0:22:57.120 on the side, you will be able to undress that woman, girl, boy, anyone. 0:22:57.480 --> 0:23:00.960 I mean, that sounds like a nightmare scenario for any parent. 0:23:01.240 --> 0:23:04.400 And Deeroda, what did you decide to do next as 0:23:04.440 --> 0:23:06.879 a mother, as a parent, what did you do? 0:23:07.760 --> 0:23:07.840 So? 0:23:08.080 --> 0:23:11.640 When Francisca came back home that evening, she has been 0:23:11.720 --> 0:23:17.920 pissed because her school suggests that there's nothing they can 0:23:17.960 --> 0:23:21.080 do to the perpetrators, she said, well, what about the 0:23:21.119 --> 0:23:25.000 code of conduct? You have it? They said, well, but 0:23:25.000 --> 0:23:27.320 they're not AI lost, so we can't really apply it. 0:23:28.000 --> 0:23:32.360 The school did have a harassment, intimidation and anti bullying 0:23:32.400 --> 0:23:38.120 policy that applied to technology, but Deoda says it was outdated, 0:23:38.600 --> 0:23:39.880 to say the least. 0:23:40.119 --> 0:23:43.160 When Francisca brought it home, she said, look, mom, they're 0:23:43.160 --> 0:23:47.160 actually referring pagers and what was it with Alice Wachman. 0:23:47.320 --> 0:23:49.399 She's like, what is a pager? What is it a Wakman? 0:23:50.480 --> 0:23:53.919 No one in authority seemed to have the right playbook 0:23:54.320 --> 0:23:58.119 to respond to what had happened at Francesca's school. 0:23:58.480 --> 0:24:01.400 Obviously, shore with a new cord war that there would 0:24:01.400 --> 0:24:03.360 be one day suspension for one boy and that's it, 0:24:04.000 --> 0:24:07.400 and that the school is offering counseling. So Francisca says, 0:24:07.480 --> 0:24:10.440 I don't need your counseling. What I need is an accountability. 0:24:11.400 --> 0:24:14.359 Their answer was there's really not much we can do 0:24:14.520 --> 0:24:15.959 because there are no laws. 0:24:16.520 --> 0:24:20.760 Did you feel at this point that you, you Da, 0:24:21.280 --> 0:24:24.000 the other young woman who have been targeted in this case, 0:24:24.720 --> 0:24:27.280 had been kind of failed in some way one. 0:24:27.280 --> 0:24:34.919 Hundred percent failed, disappointed, offended. It's a very strong message 0:24:34.960 --> 0:24:37.920 that we're sending to the female community in our high 0:24:37.920 --> 0:24:40.800 school that basically says, you know you are a girl. 0:24:40.920 --> 0:24:44.000 At some point you will wear a victim's badge, so 0:24:44.160 --> 0:24:48.479 go for counseling. Well, screw that. Yes, this happens, and 0:24:48.520 --> 0:24:51.560 it's our job to learn how to protect our image. 0:24:51.880 --> 0:24:54.879 But it's also our job to point out that certain 0:24:54.920 --> 0:25:00.119 behaviors are unacceptable and should not be cultivated, especially in 0:25:00.160 --> 0:25:02.760 the place a thief a school should be. 0:25:03.520 --> 0:25:06.600 We reached out to Westfield High School, and the school 0:25:06.680 --> 0:25:10.600 said that it can't comment on individual student matters or 0:25:10.640 --> 0:25:17.200 disciplinary actions. In a statement, the school's superintendent, Raymond Gonzales, 0:25:17.840 --> 0:25:20.880 said the incident took place outside of the school year, 0:25:21.760 --> 0:25:27.320