Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:

To ask His Majesty's Government what discussions they have had with social media platforms on measures to prevent AI-generated deepfake advertisements from being used to facilitate fraud.

The Government recognises the significant harm caused by fraudulent adverts and the potential for those adverts to be made more credible through the use of deepfakes and other generative AI tools.

The Advertising Standards Agency (ASA) is the independent regulator responsible for regulating advertising in the UK, through codes set by the Committees of Advertising Practice (CAP) and Broadcast Committee of Advertising Practice (BCAP). The codes do not restrict the use of deepfakes within advertisements. However, they do include clear rules intended to protect consumers from misleading marketing communications, and rules regarding testimonials and endorsements.

Further, Since March 2025, the Online Safety Act (OSA) has required platforms to introduce proactive measures to protect users from user-generated fraud. The OSA lists fraud as a priority offence and regulates AI-generated media in the same way as ‘real’ content. Later this month Ofcom will be going further, consulting on new measures for the largest online platforms to prevent fraudulent advertising. We are backing this up by investing £250 million to disrupt fraudsters and protect the public through our new Fraud Strategy.