Law / United States / 
Illinois
Child sexual abuse material, computer-generated and digitally altered depictions
720 ILCS 5/11-20.1 (P.A. 104-245, eff. )
In force since .
An AI prohibited practices rule binding public and private bodies.
- Obligation class
- Prohibition
- Audit expectation
- none
- Setting the rule reaches
- General
What it requires
- An artificial-intelligence-generated or digitally altered image or video that is or appears to be a child under 18 is child sexual abuse material regardless of how it was produced; do not film, produce, disseminate, solicit, or possess one.
- A still-image violation is a Class 1 felony and a moving-image violation a Class X felony for most violations, each with a mandatory minimum fine between $1,000 and $2,000 and a maximum fine of $100,000; every tier becomes a Class X felony, or a mandatory 9-year minimum for a repeat offender, where the child depicted is under 13.
These lines are LexLint's reading of the law's text.
In the frameworks
- NIST AI RMF
- MAP 3.3Targeted application scope is specified and documented based on the system’s capability, established context, and AI system categorization.
- NIST AI 600-1
- GAI-RISK-08Information Integrity
- GAI-RISK-11Obscene, Degrading, and/or Abusive Content
- MIT mitigations Draft
- FINOS AIGF
- AIR-PREV-005System Acceptance Testing
- ETSI EN 304 223
Our reading of where this law's duties sit in each framework. It never says that running a control meets the law. How we read a framework against the law
Identifiers refer to ETSI EN 304 223 V2.1.1 (2025-12), © ETSI 2025, all rights reserved. ETSI owns the standard; no ETSI text (titles or sentences) is reproduced here. The standard is free to download from ETSI.
If you get it wrong
Criminal exposureYes
Criminal exposure note
Class 1 felony (still image) or Class X felony (film, videotape, or other moving depiction) for most violations of subsection (a), each with a mandatory minimum fine of $1,000 to $2,000 (depending on which paragraph of subsection (a) was violated) and a maximum fine of $100,000; a subsection (a)(6) possession violation is a Class 3 felony (still) or Class 2 felony (moving) with a $1,000 mandatory minimum and $100,000 maximum. Where the child depicted is under 13, every tier in subsection (c) becomes a Class X felony (or Class 2 for the subsection (a)(6) possession offense), and a defendant with a qualifying prior conviction faces a mandatory minimum of 9 years (or, for the possession offense, a Class 1 felony).
Penalty structure
The $100,000 maximum fine is uniform across every tier of subsection (c) and (c-5); the mandatory minimum fine varies by paragraph of subsection (a), from $1,000 (paragraphs (2) and (6)) to $1,500 (paragraph (3)) to $2,000 (paragraphs (1), (4), (5), (7), and every subsection (c-5) tier for a victim under 13).
- Rule
- Fixed only
- As of
- Minimum
- 1,000
- Currency
- USD
- Fixed cap
- 100,000
Who enforces it
Enforcement body
A violation of this section is prosecuted by the State's Attorney for the county where it occurs, under the State's Attorney's general duty to prosecute criminal offenses; the Attorney General may attend the trial and assist in the prosecution, or investigate in connection with assisting a prosecution at a State's Attorney's request.
Enforcement record
The Illinois Attorney General's own press-release register continues to report new state prosecutions using the child sexual abuse material terminology this section adopted after its effective date, for example an charge and an sentencing, but no release in that period identifies the depicted material as computer-generated or digitally altered under the technology-neutral definition Public Act 104-245 added, so a count specific to that definition cannot be read from the register. Illinois circuit courts and the county state's attorneys who bring most prosecutions under this section publish no compiled count broken out to the amended definition either.
- As of
- Source link
- https://illinoisattorneygeneral.gov/News-Room/index
What it makes you log
Logging duty
Section 11-20.1 defines and criminalizes child sexual abuse material, extending the definition to a computer-generated or digitally altered depiction regardless of how it was produced; it creates no duty for anyone to log, record, or document an AI system's involvement in producing or detecting such material.
- Kind
- None
- As of
What this law does
Section 11-20.1(a)(7) defines child sexual abuse material to include a film, photograph, or other visual medium or depiction by computer that is or appears to be a person under 18, regardless of the method by which it is created, adopted, or modified to appear as such, a technology-neutral test that reaches an artificial-intelligence-generated or AI-altered depiction on the same footing as a photograph of a real event.
Producing, disseminating, or possessing such material is a felony under subsection (c): a still-image violation is a Class 1 felony and a moving-image violation a Class X felony for most paragraphs of subsection (a), each carrying a mandatory minimum fine and a maximum fine of $100,000, with the mandatory minimum ranging from $1,000 to $2,000 depending on which paragraph of subsection (a) was violated; subsection (c-5) raises every tier to a Class X felony, and a repeat offender to a mandatory 9-year minimum term, where the child depicted is under 13.
The section was renamed from Child Pornography to Child Sexual Abuse Material by Public Act 104-245, effective , without changing the underlying prohibition.
When LexLint raises it
When your app profile says your app generates images with AI, generates video with AI or publishes adult content.
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