Ethical Risks and Normative Paths in Digital Communication in the AIGC Era

The rapid rise of generative artificial intelligence (AIGC) has profoundly reshaped the technical foundation and ecological structure of digital communication. From the combined perspective of communication studies and technology ethics, this paper examines four shifts that AIGC has brought to digital communication: the intelligent upgrading of content production, the multimodal expansion of representational forms, the pluralistic restructuring of production subjects, and the turn toward a precise and personalized communication logic. However, viewed along four dimensions—the erosion of authenticity, the illusion of neutrality, the loss of boundaries, and the rupture of rights and responsibilities—digital communication in the AIGC era faces serious ethical risks, including the spread of false information, algorithmic bias and value skew, data security and privacy leakage, disputes over content ownership, and the weakening of media responsibility. This study argues that a normative path combining "institutional constraint, responsibility strengthening, ethical shaping, and literacy improvement" is needed, so as to keep a dynamic balance between technological innovation and ethical order and to promote the healthy development of the digital communication ecosystem.