Page 9 - Katten Kattwalk and Kattison Avenue - Winter 2026 - Issue 5

“New York has always been a home for artists, and Andersson, the company’s chief creative officer, in a
today it stands as a model for how to safeguard not LinkedIn post at the time.
only our members, but the broader public,” observed New York State legislators have been actively ex-
SAG-AFTRA New York Local President Ezra Knight in
response to the new legislation. ploring ways to curtail potential misuses of AI at the
development stage as well. On December 19, 2025,
Assembly Member Linda Rosenthal, a co-sponsor of Governor Hochul signed into law the Responsible AI
the bill, said in a statement that the “proliferation of Safety and Education Act (RAISE Act), which takes
deepfakes and other artificial intelligence has blurred effect on January 1, 2027. The legislation applies to
the lines between the digital world and reality” in companies with over $500 million in annual revenue,
harmful ways. “Consumers have a right to know if the requiring them to adhere to certain AI-development
product or service being advertised to them is by a real
person or a computer-generated avatar,” she added.
“The reduced production costs for companies using AI
is not worth the hefty price of obscuring reality.”
Relatedly, Senate Bill 8420-A, which will be effective
in June 2026, requires advertisers to conspicuously
disclose the known use of “synthetic performers”
in commercial advertisements, with a civil penalty
of $1,000 for a first violation and $5,000 per
subsequent violation. A “synthetic performer” is
defined as “a digital asset that is created, reproduced,
or modified by computer, using generative artificial
intelligence or a software algorithm, that is intended
to give the impression that the asset is in an audio,
audiovisual, and/or visual performance of a human
performer when it is not recognizable as any
identifiable natural performer.” Dutchmen Photography/Shutterstock.com

From an enforcement perspective, the law’s requirements, including the adoption of safety and
requirement of clear and conspicuous disclosure may security protocols, which must be promptly shared
be analogous to the existing standard for influencer with relevant authorities, and the conducting of an-
content on social media, which requires that nual safety reviews. The New York attorney general is
disclosures must be simple, clear and “hard to miss,” empowered under the RAISE Act to seek penalties of
per the Federal Trade Commission. up to $1 million for a first infraction and a maximum
of $3 million for later infractions. New York’s Depart-
These legal developments have arrived as the global
fashion industry explores AI usage in the generation ment of Finance will be tasked with monitoring AI
development in a newly established AI office.
of creative commercial materials. Last year, Swedish
retail heavyweight H&M set the internet on fire with Citizen advocacy groups have expressed hope that
the news that it was working with fashion models to the RAISE Act, together with the related Transparency
create their digital twins using generative AI. in Frontier Artificial Intelligence Act in California,
sets a baseline for transparency and ethics in AI
“Creativity and being radically curious have always
defined who we are at H&M. Now, we’re exploring development that may be expanded in the future.
new territory — generative AI — and discovering New York’s Senate Bill 1169A, which would amend
how technology can unlock new ways to showcase state civil rights law, relates to the potential for the
our design in innovative ways, while still staying replication and magnification of bias through AI tools
humble to our human-centric approach,” noted Jörgen and is still in committee.

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