Chile - Criminal Code Amendment (Boletín 15935-07)

Overview

Boletín 15935-07 (entered in the Chamber of Deputies on 15 May 2023) proposes targeted amendments to the Chilean Penal Code to address fraudulent conduct committed through or facilitated by artificial intelligence (AI) and analogous technologies. The bill replaces the wording of Article 468 of the Penal Code to include AI among the means by which a person may defraud another, and adds new numerals to Article 469 to (a) identify defraudation effected by AI as a specific mode of commission and (b) criminalize the manufacture, programming or instrumental use of AI with the specific purpose of defrauding. The bill is framed as a corrective to the gap between fast-evolving deceptive technologies (e.g., deepfakes, voice cloning, synthetic media) and older statutory language. Official parliamentary docket entries and the project text are available on the Chamber of Deputies site and in parliamentary repositories (see bill file (Cámara de Diputados) and a public extract at vLex Chile).

Definitions

For the purpose of the bill, the term "artificial intelligence" is used broadly to refer to computational systems or technologies capable of producing outputs (predictions, classifications, synthetic media, automated decisions) that can be used to deceive or misrepresent information or identity. The bill also refers to "analogous technologies" to capture functionally similar tools. The legislative text does not prescribe a narrow technical definition or a risk-tier taxonomy; it instead targets conduct (use, manufacture, programming) and intent (to defraud) as the criminalized elements, leaving technical specification to implementing practice and case law.

Governance and Institutional Framework

The bill itself is a penal amendment, so its primary governance mechanism is criminal enforcement: prosecutors (Ministerio Público), investigative police (Policía de Investigaciones and Carabineros for certain facts), and ordinary criminal courts will apply the amended provisions. Implementation will therefore rely heavily on law enforcement technical capacity for digital forensics, evidence preservation, cross-border cooperation with platforms and service providers, and inter-agency coordination with data protection bodies. The legislative file is publicly tracked by the Chamber of Deputies tramitación portal, and related debates and referrals (for example to the Commission on Future, Sciences and Technology) are recorded there. The project intersects with other national initiatives, including more comprehensive AI system regulation (see Boletins 15869-19 and 16821-19), and with data protection reforms; coordination among the Ministry of Science, the National Prosecutor's Office and the Data Protection Authority will be important to operationalize enforcement.

Key Focus Areas

The bill focuses on three principal areas: (1) Mode-of-commission: explicitly recognizing AI and similar technologies as instruments of defraudation, to avoid evidentiary or conceptual gaps when prosecutors charge traditional fraud offenses involving synthetic media or algorithmic impersonation; (2) Actor liability: criminalizing not only the end-user who deploys AI to defraud, but also those who manufacture or program AI systems with the intent that they be used to commit fraud; and (3) Legal clarity for courts: by amending Articles 468 and 469, the law guides judges to treat AI-enabled deception as a legally cognizable method for applying extant penalties for fraud. The project is deliberately limited in scope—targeting fraudulent uses and actors with intent to commit fraud—rather than creating a broad criminal regime for all AI development or deployment. The approach aims to preserve lawful and beneficial AI activities while deterring malicious conduct such as voice-cloning extortion, synthetic identity fraud, automated scam-bot operations, or mass-produced deepfake scams.

Implementation Framework

Operationalizing the law will require protocols for evidence collection (logs, model artifacts, metadata), procedural mechanisms for compelling platform disclosure in line with procedural law, and capacity-building in digital forensics within the Public Ministry and investigative services. Prosecutors will need guidance on proving intent where intermediary AI tools may have been used, and courts may require expert testimony regarding model capabilities and provenance. The project does not, on its face, create specialized administrative compliance requirements (e.g., registration of AI systems), but it may motivate subsequent regulatory measures or sectoral rules to improve traceability and accountability in AI development and deployment.

Monitoring and Evaluation

Because the instrument is criminal law reform, monitoring will occur through prosecutorial statistics, judicial decisions, and law enforcement reports on convictions, dismissals and investigative outcomes. Policymakers and civil society should track key indicators: number of investigations citing AI-enabled modalities, types of AI tools involved, cross-border dimensions, cooperation with technology platforms, and evidentiary obstacles. Periodic technical reviews or a mandated evaluation clause (absent from the text) would strengthen oversight, but at present evaluation will depend on ad hoc reviews by commissions and scholarly and civil-society reporting.

Penalties, Liability, and Appeals

The project ties AI-enabled fraudulent conduct to existing fraud provisions and penalties in the Penal Code; as such, sentencing follows current statutory ranges for defraudation. The proposal also introduces criminal liability for acts of manufacture, programming or provision when pursued with fraudulent intent. Liability attaches to natural persons and, consistent with Chilean criminal practice, may be relevant to corporate criminal responsibility where corporate actors are implicated through governance failures or complicity. Defendants retain standard procedural rights, and appellate remedies follow ordinary criminal appeals processes.

Relationship to Other Instruments

This penal amendment is complementary to broader legislative efforts on AI in Chile. It sits alongside other initiative(s) that aim to regulate AI systems comprehensively (Boletin 15869-19 and subsequent consolidated bills) and narrower proposals addressing identity usurpation (Boletin 16112-07). It is also related to data protection reforms, which affect processing of personal data used in synthetic media. Coherent policy requires alignment between criminal sanctions and civil/regulatory instruments (consumer protection, data protection, cybersecurity) to ensure both deterrence and avenues for redress.

International Alignment

Globally, jurisdictions are increasingly considering criminal or aggravating provisions for misuse of AI (examples include proposals in multiple Latin American legislatures and amendments to penal frameworks in other countries). While Boletin 15935-07 is narrowly tailored and domestically focused, its objectives align with international trends: recognizing AI-facilitated harms, enabling law enforcement to pursue technologically mediated offenses, and preserving lawful innovation. International cooperation will be crucial where AI platforms, tooling providers or data sources are hosted or located abroad, requiring mutual legal assistance, cross-border evidence-sharing agreements and platform cooperation protocols.

Implementation Timeline

Sources and References