CALIFORNIA - AI LAWS

Key Points

  • California introduced 11 new AI laws effective January 1, 2025, covering transparency, personal rights, criminal prohibitions, election integrity, and healthcare.

  • These laws target AI developers, telemarketers, social media platforms, health insurers, and more, with specific disclosure and supervision requirements.

  • Consumers, voters, and victims of AI misuse are the main beneficiaries, with some laws protecting deceased personalities and children.

New California AI Laws Effective January 1, 2025

California has taken significant steps to regulate artificial intelligence (AI) with 11 new laws effective from January 1, 2025, as outlined in legal advisories from Attorney General Rob Bonta. These laws aim to ensure transparency, protect personal rights, prevent criminal misuse, safeguard election integrity, and regulate AI in healthcare. They impact various industries, including AI development, telemarketing, social media, and health insurance, with specific requirements like disclosures and supervision by licensed professionals.

California's Attorney General Rob Bonta issued two legal advisories on January 13, 2025, addressing the application of existing and new California laws to artificial intelligence (AI), with a focus on general applications and healthcare-specific regulations. These advisories, accessible at Legal Advisory on AI and Healthcare AI Advisory, summarize 11 new laws effective from January 1, 2025, aimed at regulating AI development and use across various sectors. This report provides a detailed analysis of each law, including its name, effective date, targeted businesses and industries, specific requirements or prohibitions, and intended beneficiaries, categorized by their primary focus for clarity.

Categorization and Analysis

Transparency and Disclosure Laws

These laws focus on ensuring transparency in AI development and use, particularly in consumer-facing and political contexts.

  • AB 2013 (Irwin): AI Developers' Training Data Disclosure

    • Effective Date: January 1, 2025, operative on or before January 1, 2026

    • Targeted Businesses and Industries: AI developers

    • Specific Requirements or Prohibitions: Requires AI developers to disclose training data information on their websites, including a high-level summary of the datasets used to train their AI models. The operative date suggests compliance must be in place by January 1, 2026.

    • Intended Beneficiaries: Consumers, to ensure transparency about how AI models are trained, fostering trust and accountability.

    • Reference: California Civil Code, Section 3110 et seq.

  • AB 2905 (Low): Telemarketing AI-Generated Content Disclosure

    • Effective Date: January 1, 2025

    • Targeted Businesses and Industries: Telemarketers using AI-generated or significantly modified synthetic marketing in their calls

    • Specific Requirements or Prohibitions: Mandates disclosure that the call uses AI-generated or modified content, ensuring consumers are aware of AI interaction.

    • Intended Beneficiaries: Consumers, to be informed when interacting with AI in telemarketing calls, protecting against deception.

    • Reference: California Public Utilities Code, Section 2874

  • SB 942 (Becker): AI-Generated Content Detection Tools

    • Effective Date: January 1, 2025, operative starting January 1, 2026

    • Targeted Businesses and Industries: AI developers

    • Specific Requirements or Prohibitions: Requires AI developers to provide free, accessible tools to detect AI-generated content, with visible markings indicating it's AI-generated, enhancing detectability.

    • Intended Beneficiaries: Consumers and the public, to identify and distinguish AI-generated content, reducing misinformation.

    • Reference: California Business and Professions Code, Section 22757 et seq.

  • AB 2355 (Carrillo): AI-Generated Campaign Ads Disclosure

    • Effective Date: January 1, 2025

    • Targeted Businesses and Industries: Campaigns and political ads

    • Specific Requirements or Prohibitions: Requires any campaign ad generated or substantially altered by AI to include a disclosure statement: “Ad generated or substantially altered using artificial intelligence,” ensuring voter awareness.

    • Intended Beneficiaries: Voters, to be informed when political ads are AI-generated or modified, protecting electoral integrity.

    • Reference: California Government Code, Section 84504 et seq.

Protection of Personal Rights

These laws aim to safeguard individuals' rights against misuse of AI, particularly in digital replicas and explicit content.

  • AB 2602 (Kalra): Contracts for AI-Generated Digital Replicas

    • Effective Date: January 1, 2025

    • Targeted Businesses and Industries: Entities creating AI-generated digital replicas of voice or likeness

    • Specific Requirements or Prohibitions: Contracts for such replicas must include specific descriptions and legal representation. Without these, the contract is unenforceable, unless the terms are consistent with the work performed, ensuring legal clarity.

    • Intended Beneficiaries: Individuals whose voice or likeness is used, to protect their rights and ensure proper contractual agreements.

    • Reference: California Labor Code, Section 927

  • AB 1836 (Bauer-Kahan): Protection of Deceased Personalities' Digital Replicas

    • Effective Date: January 1, 2025

    • Targeted Businesses and Industries: Entities using digital replicas of deceased personalities

    • Specific Requirements or Prohibitions: Prohibits using a deceased personality’s digital replica without consent within 70 years of their death, with a minimum fine of $10,000, protecting legacy.

    • Intended Beneficiaries: Families and estates of deceased personalities, to protect their legacy and commercial value.

    • Reference: California Civil Code, Section 3344.1

  • SB 926 (Wahab): Criminal Penalties for Nonconsensual Deepfake Pornography

    • Effective Date: January 1, 2025

    • Targeted Businesses and Industries: Individuals or entities creating nonconsensual pornography using deepfake technology

    • Specific Requirements or Prohibitions: Extends criminal penalties to the creation of nonconsensual pornography using deepfake technology, addressing a growing concern.

    • Intended Beneficiaries: Victims of nonconsensual deepfake pornography, to have legal recourse against creators.

    • Reference: California Penal Code, Section 647

  • SB 981 (Wahab): Reporting Mechanism for Sexual Explicit Digital Identity Theft on Social Media

    • Effective Date: January 1, 2025

    • Targeted Businesses and Industries: Social media platforms

    • Specific Requirements or Prohibitions: Must provide a mechanism for California users to report sexually explicit digital identity theft or deepfake pornography, enhancing user protection.

    • Intended Beneficiaries: Users whose digital identities are misused, to have a way to report such content and seek redress.

    • Reference: California Business and Professions Code, Section 22670 et seq.

Criminal Prohibitions

This category focuses on expanding criminal laws to cover AI-generated content, particularly in sensitive areas.

  • AB 1831 (Berman), SB 1381 (Wahab): AI-Created Child Sexual Exploitation Material

    • Effective Date: January 1, 2025

    • Targeted Businesses and Industries: Entities creating or distributing visual depictions of child sexual abuse or exploitation using AI

    • Specific Requirements or Prohibitions: Expands criminal prohibitions to include AI-created visual depictions of child sexual abuse or exploitation, closing a legal gap.

    • Intended Beneficiaries: Children and society, to prevent and criminalize the creation and distribution of such content, enhancing child protection.

    • Reference: California Penal Code, Sections 311, 311.2, 311.3, 311.4, 311.11, 311.12, 312.3

Election Integrity

This law addresses the use of AI in elections, focusing on preventing deception.

  • AB 2655 (Berman): Online Platforms' Handling of Deceptive Election-Related Deepfakes

    • Effective Date: January 1, 2025

    • Targeted Businesses and Industries: Large online platforms with at least 1 million California users

    • Specific Requirements or Prohibitions: Must identify and remove deceptive election-related deepfakes, label such content, and provide a reporting mechanism for users, ensuring electoral integrity.

    • Intended Beneficiaries: Voters and the public, to prevent misinformation and deception in elections, with enforcement stayed through June 28, 2025, due to a legal challenge (Kohls v. Bonta, E.D. Cal., No. 2:24-cv-02527 JAM-CKD).

    • Reference: California Code of Civil Procedure, Section 35; California Elections Code, Section 20510

Healthcare Regulation

This law ensures proper oversight of AI in healthcare, protecting patient interests.

  • SB 1120 (Becker): Supervision of AI Tools in Healthcare by Licensed Physicians

    • Effective Date: January 1, 2025

    • Targeted Businesses and Industries: Health insurers

    • Specific Requirements or Prohibitions: Must ensure that licensed physicians supervise AI tools used for healthcare services or insurance claims decisions, ensuring medical oversight.

    • Intended Beneficiaries: Patients and consumers, to ensure that AI in healthcare is properly overseen by medical professionals, reducing risks.

    • Reference: California Health and Safety Code, Section 1367.01; California Insurance Code, Section 10123.135