[INSPRATIONAL MUSIC STING] - Hi, everyone.

Steve Adubato.

We kick off the program welcoming back to the program Assemblywoman Ellen Park, a Democrat from the 37th Legislative District in Bergen County, right, Assemblywoman?

- Correct.

Good morning.

- Great to see you.

We are taping in the morning.

Put this in perspective for us.

What is the New Jersey Asia-Pacific Center in Taiwan and why is it related to New Jersey?

- So, there's a not-for-profit called Choose NJ that is basically branching outside of New Jersey and to countries in Asia as well as all of Europe to basically let people outside of New Jersey, around the world know what a great place to have a business here in New Jersey.

So Taiwan, Taipei, Taiwan, is going to be the hub office for offices throughout Asia.

So there are offices as well, satellite offices in Korea, Japan, China, but Taipei, Taiwan is going to be the hub of all the offices in East Asia.

- That's important, and for the folks at Choose New Jersey, we're gonna put up the website of Choose New Jersey right now so people can find out more about the New Jersey Asia-Pacific Center in Taiwan.

So let's shift gears Assemblywoman.

You've been very involved in what's called deepfakes.

- Yeah.

- Confronting, dealing with, proposing legislation that, what the heck is?

I think I know what a deepfake is.

Again, what it's going on in terms of technology today.

It's helpful and dangerous at the same time.

- Absolutely.

- What is a deepfake, A, and B, what is your legislation doing to confront this serious problem?

- A deepfake is, you know, I guess in the simplistic form is let's say I use your face on an image that's not actually you.

So people who are looking at it think it's actually you, but it's somebody else's body or someone else in a video, and they basically just use your imagery to say that that is you.

So, especially when it comes to elections moving forward, we have these deepfakes that can mimic the President or a candidate, but it's not them, and it's really important that we have disclosure saying that the depicted image is actually not real.

- Where is that?

Does that go on the bottom of the screen, Assemblywoman?

- That will be on the bottom of the screen, correct.

So, that's- - And why is this particularly a problem with younger people?

- Again, I think it's mostly younger, especially elderly.

You know, we were just talking about this the other day in my home.

I'm not gonna name who, but one of our elders in our family saw a video where they trained giraffes to jump off a diving board and they're swimming in a lake or a pool, and my kids thought it was really funny that my family member thought that that was real, but it's not, clearly.

It's just, it's fake.

It's fake AI, and there's so many images out there that are fake.

Especially there was that incident in a Jersey high school where they used this poor girl's face and put it on some pornographic material.

And again, there has to be repercussions and we need to tell the public what is real and what is not.

- You know, what's so crazy about, I didn't think I would be disclosing this, but I told one of our colleagues this on our team who helped take this down, but someone came to me and said, this is gonna sound nutty, right?

Said, "Do you know that you're on Bumble?"

So I said, "Wait, I'm on Bumble?"

- Right.

- Now, I don't think, my wife and I don't have that.

So I said, "Where is it?"

And so someone showed me the picture, and it was someone who used a picture from on camera.

I didn't think it was a particularly good image of me, but more importantly said "John Smith."

The age was younger, which I liked.

- Right.

- I showed it to my wife and we couldn't stop laughing.

And I thought someone for some ridiculous reason, who knows why, used an image of me from the air on Bumble with a different name.

Is that a deepfake, A, and B, would it be required in your legislation that someone says, "This isn't really Steve Adubato.

"This is a deepfake."

- Yes, that's the goal, but of course on a personal account, it's a little different.

But at least for the starting off to ask for the media and anything that's publicated, anything on TV, we're definitely going to have a disclosure saying that the depicted image is not a real image.

- Yeah, and by the way, I just wanna confirm, not on Bumble, which is a dating site Not on it.

- Right, right, right.

- I'm just clarifying, Assemblywoman, okay?

Let's try this.

I'm curious about this, and I just told you before we got on the air that every member of the legislature, Democrat, Republican, every significant public official from my view needs to be asked this question.

The New Jersey Open Public Records Act has recently been changed.

The governor signed, Governor Murphy signed legislation to change it.

Some people have argued that what the governor did by signing this legislation, which most legislators voted for, which is why it got passed and went to the governor, that it's made it harder for people to access public records, to access votes that legislators have taken, that local government officials have taken, that all kinds of things that happen in local community school boards.

Did you abstain on that vote?

- I did.

- Why?

- And the reason why is I'm actually really split down the middle.

I'm torn.

I've had personal experiences on both sides.

So, I actually sued my former mayor for information, and as a council person, I really didn't need to sue him for OPRA.

But instead of giving our party- - OPRA is the Open Public Records Act.

- Correct.

- That is the acronym for it.

Go ahead.

I apologize, Assemblywoman.

- That's okay.

So instead of giving us the materials, right, we're in different parties, he said, "OPRA them," which that was my only recourse at the time, right?

So I did OPRA them and he still didn't give it to me, and of course we sued, and it took years to get this emails that we're searching.

And of course, these emails were given to his party that were sitting members on the council, whereas our party didn't get any emails, so I'm on that side.

And then the other side is someone OPRA'ed all of my building permits when I was renovating my home.

And of course- - You private home?

- Correct.

And they used it against me.

You know, the other party used it against me to say that I did some sort of wrongdoing, which they hired an outside inspector from another town and he came out and wrote a letter saying that I didn't do anything wrong and I followed protocols, but of course that was never released, right?

Instead they made this huge "majig" thing to do to basically try to tarnish my political reputation.

So I'm literally like down the middle when it comes to this issue.

And there are some very good things about the bill.

- Assemblywoman, hold on one second.

You're saying utilizing the Open Public Records Act, otherwise known as OPRA, can be abused, is your argument?

- Absolutely, and I'm saying that I have not been given records that I should have gotten, and the flip side is people have gotten records that had nothing to do with anything in order to use it against me.

So I'm not sure even why- So this is not a black and white issue.

- I'm sorry.

- Sorry, this is not a black and white issue for you, right?

- No, no, no.

- It's not so obvious.

- It's one of the reasons why I abstained, is I've been on both sides and I know how this works.

And so the proponents of this bill, there are some good things about this bill, which is they're gonna make almost everything public so that you don't have to OPRA that, right?

And then you talk about technology, right?

Things that you should be able to get with the click of a mouse, it's going to be on the website for the municipalities that have the technology.

The flip side of it is we're talking about I think the biggest issue was the fee shifting, right?

Is that when you hire an attorney to sue for ORPA, if they prevail, then they will get paid for their time, and which that was the case for me.

I hired an outside attorney, we prevailed.

He got paid, right?

And from what I hear as well, and it's not Bergen County, but there are other counties where this is also getting abused, a couple of attorneys have made a career out of getting these, suing for OPRA.

And so I think we have to see how this goes.

Let's see what happens.

If we need to amend the bill, we'll come back and amend the bill, but I definitely believe that there needs to be some OPRA regulation.

- Assemblywoman, we appreciate you joining us and speaking candidly about a whole range of issues.

I wish you all the best.

Thank you.

- Thank you.

- Stay with us.

We'll be right back.

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