A U.S. telecommunications company that has been fined $1 million for transmitting a fraudulent campaign call featuring a fake voice of U.S. President Joe Biden, generated using artificial intelligence (AI) agreed to pay the penalty.
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) on Wednesday said that Lingo Telecom agreed to pay the fine and had also committed to a unique program to verify the trustworthiness of customers who use its networks to transmit data.
The fraudulent call, with a voice that sounded deceptively like Biden's, was used to call voters in the U.S. state of New Hampshire in January and urge them not to participate in the Democratic Party's primary election.
The voice of Biden in the call was generated using AI software and the sender information was also falsified, making it appear to come from a Democratic political committee.
"Every one of us deserves to know that the voice on the line is exactly who they claim to be," FCC chair Jessica Rosenworcel said. "If AI is being used, that should be made clear to any consumer, citizen and voter who encounters it," she added.
In May, the FCC proposed a fine of $6 million for the originator of the call, a political consultant.
The incident raised concerns in the U.S. about the potential misuse of AI, especially in the run-up to the presidential election in November.
As a result, the FCC has strengthened the legal framework for taking action against such AI fakes.
