FOI 723/24 Deepfake Pornography Imagery
Dear Sir/Madam
Enquiry Reference: 723 - 24
I write in connection with regards to your Freedom of Information request. Below is your request and our response.
- The number of reports made to the police force relating to the creation of “deepfake” pornographic imagery over the past five years, broken down by year
- The referral route of the report where applicable, including but not limited to a member of the public, a company, a social media firm, a school/teachers etc.
- The gender of the alleged victim(s) where stated
- The age of the alleged victim(s) where stated
- The number of arrests made in relation to the creation of the deepfake imagery over the past five years, broken down by year
- The number of people charged in relation to the creation of the deepfake imagery over the past five years, broken down by year
- The number of people released on bail in relation to the creation of the deepfake imagery over the past five years broken down by year, and the reasons why they were released
- The gender of those arrested, charged or released on bail over the past five years, broken down by year
- The average length for an investigation into a report of deepfake imagery over the past five years, broken down by year
Section 1 of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (FOIA) places two duties on public authorities. Unless exemptions apply, the first duty at Section 1 (1) (a) is to confirm or deny whether the information specified in a request is held. The second duty at Sec 1(1) (b) is to disclose information that has been confirmed as being held. Where exemptions are relied upon s17 of FOIA requires that we provide the applicant with a notice which: a) states that fact b) specifies the exemption(s) in question and c) states (if that would not otherwise be apparent) why the exemption applies.
Having made enquiries within the Force there is not a home office code for deep fakes, these could fall under 088/15 – Sharing or threating to share intimate photograph or film or 008/71 – Revenge porn. To ascertain if a deepfake was involved each one would need to be read there are over 400 crimes and at 5 minutes a record would over 40 hours and this does not include the time to set up the query to obtain this information. This would take in of the appropriate time stipulated by the Secretary for Constitutional Affairs, Lord Falconer on the 18th Of October 2004, that is, eighteen hours. This falls under the exemption of 'Compliance exceeding the appropriate limit' covered by Section 12 (1) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 and as such this work could not be undertaken.
Therefore, please treat this as a refusal notice under S17 of the Freedom of information Act.
As once one part of a request is over the time limit the whole request is.
In accordance with Section 16 of the Act we have a duty to provide advice and assistance if you shorten the time scale, we will endeavour to respond however this should not be taken as a precedent that this would be supplied outside of the time/fee’s legislation.
The Cleveland Police response to your request is unique and it should be noted that Police Forces do not use generic systems or identical procedures to capture and record data therefore responses from Cleveland Police should not be used as a comparison with any other force response you receive.
If you are not satisfied with this response or any actions taken in dealing with your request, you have the right to request an independent internal review of your case under our review procedure. The Freedom of Information Code of Practice (see below link) states that a request for internal review should be made within 20 working days of the date on this response or 40 working days if extenuating circumstances to account for the delay can be evidenced. Public authorities are not obliged to accept internal reviews after this date.
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/freedom-of-information-code-of-practice
Yours sincerely
Information Rights Decision Maker