Delitos cibernéticos y la regulación normativa frente a la inteligencia artificial

Abstract

The rapid rise of artificial intelligence in the digital sphere has radically transformed how cybercrimes are committed, creating a critical regulatory gap in national legal systems, including Ecuador's. This paper therefore provides a timely and current analysis of the capacity ofthe existing legal framework particularly the Comprehensive Organic Criminal Code (COIP) to address emerging criminal behaviors such as deepfakes and phishing, phenomena that challenge traditional criminal categories. The research falls within the field of Criminal Law and New Technologies and adopts a mixed, bibliographic-statistical approach at an exploratory-descriptive level. A validated questionnaire was administered to a sample of 100 lawyers from Ambato, selected through convenience sampling, complemented by systematic documentary analysis of national and international regulations. Findings reveal significant gaps in the COIP, a lack of specific criminalization of Al-related offenses, and a widespread perception of institutional inadequacy in investigating these crimes. As a scientific novelty, the study proposes introducing an autonomous criminal offense for Al-generated false intimate content and treating the use of AI as an aggravating factor—a proposal aimed not only at closing penal loopholes but also at ensuring the protection of fundamental rights in the algorithmic era, thus offering a concrete contribution to the contemporary criminal law debate in Ecuador.