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In a maximum security mental health facility in Montreal is a "cave-like" virtual reality vault that's used to show images of child sexual abuse to sex offenders. Patients sit inside the vault with devices placed around their penises to measure signs of arousal as they are shown computer-generated animations of naked children.
"We do develop pornography, but these images and animations are not used for the pleasure of the patient but to assess them," said Patrice Renaud, who heads up the project at the Institut Philippe-Pinel. "It's a bit like using a polygraph but with other measurement techniques."
The system, combined with other psychological assessments, is used to build up a profile of the individual's sexual preferences that can be used by the court to determine the risk they pose to society and by mental health professionals to determine treatment.
[...] The patients sit on a stool inside the chamber wearing stereoscopic glasses which create the three-dimensional effect on the surrounding walls. The glasses are fitted with eye-tracking technology to ensure they aren't trying to trick the system by avoiding looking at the critical content.
Source: The Guardian
(Score: 4, Interesting) by kaszz on Thursday June 08 2017, @10:40PM (3 children)
In France, virtual child porn is forbidden. And in the US the law says that any realistic appearing computer generated depiction that is indistinguishable from a depiction of an actual minor in sexual situations or engaging in sexual acts is illegal under 18 U.S.C. ยง 2252A. The Australian state of Victoria also seems to have some screwed laws.
This is borderline thought crime. Just consider that if you wrote a formula that produced a illegal picture, would that be illegal to write it on a blackboard? and in any case you may not plot what the formula because the resulting output would be illegal. And if you would think of it, now is that illegal?
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 08 2017, @10:57PM
If a machine learning algorithm creates a realistic appearing computer generated depiction of a nude minor, who gets arrested?
(Score: 2) by linuxrocks123 on Friday June 09 2017, @03:17AM
Re US law: computer-generated child pornography is only illegal if it's also obscene. There was a Supreme Court case on this, Ashcroft v. Free Speech Coalition.
This is not a trivial distinction: obscenity under US law is very strictly defined, and it is very hard to get a court to find something with any artistic component whatsoever to be legally obscene. The US may have its faults, but we're serious about our free speech.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 09 2017, @07:57AM
Which sends a loud and clear message that molesting a child and taking pictures of it is just as bad as molesting a pencil.