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Law / United States / Texas

S.B. 441 (2025), unlawful production or distribution of AI deep fake sexually explicit media

Tex. Penal Code § 21.165

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

  • Do not knowingly produce or distribute by electronic means deep fake media that, without the depicted person's effective consent, appears to show them with computer-generated intimate parts or engaging in sexual conduct they did not engage in; doing so is a Class A misdemeanor, elevated to a third-degree felony if you have a prior conviction under this section or the person depicted is younger than 18.
  • Do not threaten to produce or distribute such deep fake media to coerce, extort, harass, or intimidate someone; doing so is a Class B misdemeanor, elevated to a Class A misdemeanor under the same two aggravators.
  • A disclaimer that the media is unauthorized or not authentic is not a defense.
  • A general-purpose AI application or software provider has an affirmative defense only if its terms prohibit creating this content and it takes active technical steps against it, such as training the system to identify such media, providing reporting tools, and filtering it from outputs and training data.

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
MIT mitigations Draft
  • 1.5Safety Decision Frameworks
  • 3.3Access Management
NIST Privacy Framework
  • CT.PO-P1Policies, processes, and procedures for authorizing data processing (e.g., organizational decisions, individual consent), revoking authorizations, and maintaining authorizations are established and in place.
FINOS AIGF
ETSI EN 304 223
  • 5.1.2-1Business need and security risks written down and assessed before deciding to build an AI system.
  • 5.1.4-5End-users told which uses of the system are prohibited.

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

Producing or distributing deep fake sexually explicit media without consent is a Class A misdemeanor, elevated to a felony of the third degree where the actor has a prior conviction under this section or the person depicted is younger than 18; threatening to produce or distribute such media is a Class B misdemeanor, elevated to a Class A misdemeanor under the same two aggravators.

What it makes you log

Logging duty

Section 21.165 creates a criminal offense and does not itself state a duty to create, keep, or produce a log or record. Subsection (c-5) offers an artificial intelligence application or software provider an affirmative defense conditioned on having prohibited this conduct in its terms and having taken listed technical steps, but that is an optional path to a defense at trial, not a duty imposed on anyone.

Kind
None
As of

What this law does

Drafted with AI

Drafted with AI from the cited sources under the direction of UnGovr staff. UnGovr holds editorial responsibility for this page. How this site is made

Research summary

Legal information, not legal advice. This is LexLint's own research summary of a public legal source, and it creates no attorney-client relationship. For decisions that matter, consult qualified counsel in the relevant jurisdiction. About LexLint

A person commits an offense by knowingly producing or distributing, by electronic means and without the depicted person's effective consent, deep fake media (visual material created or altered by software, machine learning, artificial intelligence, or other technological means) that appears to depict that person with computer-generated intimate parts or engaging in sexual conduct they did not engage in.

A separate offense covers intentionally threatening to produce or distribute such media to coerce, extort, harass, or intimidate.

The provision was originally enacted in 2023 and has since been amended, effective ; a general-purpose AI application or software provider has an affirmative defense if its terms prohibit this use and it takes active technical steps against it, such as training the system to identify prohibited content, providing reporting tools, and filtering it from outputs and training data. A disclaimer that the media is unauthorized or inauthentic is not a defense.

When LexLint raises it

When your app profile says your app generates images with AI, generates video with AI, publishes adult content or operates a social platform.

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