It is useless fight to stop 'deepfake' porn, says Scarlett Johansson

Los Angeles: "Avengers: Infinity War" star Scarlett Johansson believes fighting deepfake porn videos, which she has often fell victim to, is a "lost cause".

In an interview with The Washington Post, the 34-year-old actor said she can do nothing about the deepfakes, a type of explicit content where anonymous users can insert people's faces onto the bodies of others, creating seemingly authentic-looking videos, and therefore she is is not bothered about them.

"Clearly this doesn't affect me as much because people assume it's not actually me in a porno, however demeaning it is. I think it's a useless pursuit, legally, mostly because the internet is a vast wormhole of darkness that eats itself.

"There are far more disturbing things on the dark web than this, sadly. I think it's up to an individual to fight for their own right to the their image, claim damages, etc," Johansson said.
The newspaper reported that of the several hundreds, one fake movie featuring Johansson's face is available on a major porn site and has been viewed over 1.5 million times.
"It's a fruitless pursuit for me but a different situation than someone who loses a job over their image being used like that."

The actor explained that it is impossible to target such sites as there are different laws governing porn distribution in each country.

"Even if you copyright pictures with your image that belong to you, the same copyright laws don't apply overseas. I have sadly been down this road many, many times.

"The fact is that trying to protect yourself from the internet and its depravity is basically a lost cause, for the most part," she added. Johansson said not just the celebrities but many vulnerable people have been targeted with fake porn.

"The Internet is just another place where sex sells and vulnerable people are preyed upon. And any low level hacker can steal a password and steal an identity. It's just a matter of time before any one person is targeted.

"People think that they are protected by their internet passwords and that only public figures or people of interest are hacked. But the truth is, there is no difference between someone hacking my account or someone hacking the person standing behind me on line at the grocery store's account. It just depends on whether or not someone has the desire to target you," she said.

In 2011, Johansson's phone was hacked and private nude photos of the star were leaked onto the internet. The hacker was later arrested and sentenced to 10 years in prison. 

"There are basically no rules on the internet because it is an abyss that remains virtually lawless, withstanding US policies which, again, only apply here," she added.