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NOPE · AI and people

AI incidents

Reports of AI-related harm and adverse experiences affecting people’s safety, wellbeing, rights and livelihoods. Explore what happened and the evidence available.

NOPE’s core concern is when AI communicates with a person, acts on their behalf, or depicts or impersonates them. The tracker also records consequential decisions, claims and privacy harms involving AI. Each case needs a described connection between AI use and the harm, including private information recorded into or disclosed to an AI service. Each account is reviewed for publication; claims may remain uncorroborated or disputed. How we review and count cases

In this selection

Published cases
72
Countries with reported events
24
Located 46 of 72 cases · 26 unknown
Languages in checked sources
20
Recorded for 72 of 72 cases

16 cases have no reviewed AI-to-person relation yet: 7 not yet reviewed and 9 reviewed as unknown. Show these cases

These figures describe the cases collected by NOPE. Coverage varies with discovery, reporting and available evidence. They do not estimate how often AI-related harm occurs.

Response counts currently use each case’s principal recorded outcome. Further proceedings may be described in its account.

Cases in this selection, counted once in their first known event year. A series may continue beyond that year. Reporting and collection dates are excluded. NOPE has searched recent events more thoroughly than earlier years, so bar heights also reflect collection effort.

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72 of 868 published cases · page 2 of 4

Apr 2024GermanyUnidentified website and voice tool

Detmold, Germany: court convicts a man who admitted using AI to build fake shop websites and a generated voice in frauds on 32 buyers

A man tried before the lay-assessor court in Detmold, Germany, confessed to taking 19,190 euros between April 2024 and September 2025 from 32 buyers who paid for box-spring beds, kitchens and cars listed on eBay or TikTok that never existed, the Lippische Landes-Zeitung reported on 4 August 2026. He told the court that AI had helped him build the fake shop websites he used to make the offers look credible and that he had generated a female voice with AI for a telephone call with a customer. The court convicted him of fraud in 32 cases and sentenced him to two and a half years in prison; his appeal is pending. On 13 October 2026 the court acquitted his former partner, in whose name several of the accounts had been opened.

Core concern Medium reported severity Criminal Charges

AI involvement reported · Causal attribution supported · 2 sources, 1 underlying account · Added 14/10/2026

1 Jul 2026Event location unknownIndie Campers chatbot (reported)

Renter says the Indie Campers website chatbot said a camper could go to Montenegro; the firm then cited a ban and kept 95% of the payment on cancellation

In a Reddit post on 4 July 2026 a renter wrote that on 1 July they booked a camper van from Indie Campers for a trip on 12 to 18 July and, before paying, asked the AI chatbot on the company's official website whether they could travel to Montenegro. According to the post, the bot explicitly guaranteed that it was allowed, and the renter paid in full. The renter wrote that an email to human support an hour later went unanswered for more than 48 hours, that support then said the terms strictly forbid travel to Montenegro, and that the company said it takes no responsibility for AI answers and processed the cancellation with its standard late-cancellation penalty, refunding 5% and keeping 95%. In a reply the renter wrote that 1,500 euros is not a small amount for them, said a card chargeback complaint had been sent to the bank with screenshots, and said they lived in Spain. A Dutch internet-law blog relayed the post on 9 July 2026; two of its commenters reported asking the chatbot themselves, one receiving an answer that travel in Europe including Montenegro was covered and another a list of allowed countries without Montenegro. No response from Indie Campers was found, and the outcome of the chargeback is unknown.

Core concern Medium reported severity

AI involvement reported · Causal attribution alleged · 2 sources · Added 13/10/2026

1 Sept 2026Event location unknownUnidentified AI drafting tool

Austria: Federal Administrative Court fines a litigant EUR 200 for hundreds of pages of submissions it found were AI-generated and unlabelled

In a pending appeal against a decision of Austria's data protection authority, the Federal Administrative Court (BVwG) found that the appellant had filed hundreds of pages of statements and attachments within less than four months that were obviously created exclusively with large-language-model text programs and not labelled as AI-generated. In a decision of 1 September 2026 the court imposed a EUR 200 penalty for wanton use of the court, holding that the AI-assisted filings repeated the same complaints, brought no new facts or evidence and ignored the EU labelling duty for AI-generated content. The court announced it as the first such penalty for AI submissions. The appellant is anonymised and the appellant's response is not reported.

Core concern Low reported severity Regulatory Action

AI involvement supported · Causal attribution established · 3 sources, 1 underlying account · Added 13/10/2026

1 Jan 2026BrazilGrok

Rio de Janeiro state: musician says Grok turned her New Year's Eve photo into bikini and nude images at X users' requests; she filed a police report

A musician in Rio de Janeiro state, Brazil, says she posted a photo of herself in bed with her cat on X just before midnight on New Year's Eve 2025, and the next morning found that anonymous users had asked X's built-in chatbot Grok to edit it. According to her accounts to G1, Correio Braziliense, Extra and Reuters, Grok produced versions showing her in a micro-bikini, in lingerie and fully nude, and more requests followed when she protested. She described feeling violated and afraid that colleagues or relatives would see the images, and filed a police report in Rio de Janeiro on 2 January 2026 for unauthorised recording of sexual intimacy. She says X removed one requesting account but told her it found no rule violation in her case. BBC News Brasil returned to the case in October 2026.

Core concern Medium reported severity Media Coverage

AI involvement reported · Causal attribution supported · 5 sources, 4 underlying accounts · Added 13/10/2026

28 Jun 2025EgyptDeepSeek

Case report: man self-treated with colchicine after a DeepSeek dialogue pointed to a rare fever syndrome; liver enzymes rose before specialist review

Clinicians at the University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf report in EULAR Rheumatology Open (published 29 September 2026) a man in his thirties with nearly three decades of unexplained febrile attacks who, in a dialogue with DeepSeek begun on 28 June 2025, saw the model's differential narrow to familial Mediterranean fever (FMF). The authors write that the model repeatedly recommended specialist assessment but also discussed a diagnostic trial of colchicine with specific dosing. Motivated by the hypothesis, he arranged commercial genetic testing and obtained colchicine from a pharmacy in Egypt, starting it without specialist supervision. His attacks stopped, but his alanine aminotransferase rose to 160 U/L and colchicine was paused and later resumed at a lower dose. FMF was confirmed when he presented to the clinic in February 2026. The authors write that the case illustrates how patient-facing models may facilitate recognition of rare autoinflammatory diseases, and that confident diagnostic language combined with actionable treatment advice may also encourage unsupervised testing and self-medication.

Core concern Low reported severity Media Coverage

AI involvement reported · Causal attribution alleged · 1 source · Added 12/10/2026

Event date unknownSpainUnidentified voice-cloning tool

La Rioja, Spain: Guardia Civil says a parent sent 9,980 euros after a call with an AI clone of their daughter's voice; the money was recovered

The Guardia Civil in La Rioja said on 25 August 2026 that it had solved a 'relative in trouble' fraud in which the criminals used artificial intelligence to clone the voice of the victim's daughter. According to the force's account as reported by the newspaper La Rioja and Radio Arnedo, the victim received WhatsApp messages from an unknown number by someone posing as the daughter and asking for urgent money; when the victim called that number to check, a voice that sounded like the daughter answered, and the victim transferred 9,980.25 euros. Investigators of the Guardia Civil's technology team established that the voice had been generated with AI tools. Urgent coordination with the banks froze the funds in the destination account and the full amount was returned to the victim; Radio Arnedo and ActualidadRiojaBaja report that the presumed perpetrator was identified and investigated.

Core concern Low reported severity Investigation Opened

AI involvement reported · Causal attribution supported · 4 sources, 1 underlying account · Added 11/10/2026

Sept 2025 to Jan 2026AustraliaUnidentified AI writing tool

Weldborough, Tasmania: AI-written tour-website article invented hot springs; publican says travellers, including a group of 24 drivers, detoured to find them

An AI-generated article on the Tasmania Tours booking website described "Weldborough Hot Springs", a "secluded forest retreat" with pools "rich in therapeutic minerals", as one of the best hot-spring experiences in Tasmania. No such springs exist: the Weld River that runs through Weldborough, a small town in north-east Tasmania, is cold. ABC News reported on 22 January 2026 that travellers who read the article had been turning up at the town's pub, the Weldborough Hotel, to ask for directions, and the publican said she was receiving daily calls and visits and that a group of 24 drivers on a trip from the mainland had taken a detour two days earlier to find the springs. ABC News reported that the article was posted in July 2025, and The Independent, citing ABC News and CNN, reported that inquiries began with a few calls in September 2025. The operator, Australian Tours and Cruises, said its outsourced AI content had "completely messed up", that some posts had gone live by mistake, and that all AI-generated blog posts had been taken down. The reports describe the travellers only as a group; no individual traveller is interviewed, and the AI tool is not named. In The Independent's paraphrase, the publican also said the post brought "a bit of a tourism boon" for Weldborough.

Core concern Low reported severity Media Coverage

AI involvement reported · Causal attribution alleged · 2 sources, 1 underlying account · Added 10/10/2026

Event date unknownUnited Kingdom, GeorgiaUnidentified video tool

England: a man told the Guardian he lost £27,000 to a Tbilisi call-centre fraud after a deepfake video of broadcaster Ben Fogle led him to a crypto site

A man in his 30s from East Anglia, England, told the Guardian (pseudonym used) that he watched a video of broadcaster Ben Fogle apparently promoting cryptocurrency trading on a site called AdmiralsFX, entered his details, was called by what turned out to be a Tbilisi call centre, paid a £250 buy-in and within a month had handed over £27,000, about a year's salary. The Guardian describes the clip as a deepfake, a digitally doctored video Fogle had publicly warned about in spring 2024. The account was published in March 2025 as part of a Guardian, SVT and OCCRP investigation of a leak from the Georgian operation, which the Guardian says duped at least 6,179 people and whose victims frequently cited the deepfake ads as the reason they went ahead.

Core concern Medium reported severity Investigation Opened

AI involvement reported · Causal attribution alleged · 1 source · Added 09/10/2026

Event date unknownUnited KingdomChatGPT (suspected)

Former social-media employee in England says her ex-employer's ad uses an AI-altered still of her, eye colour changed and tattoos removed (first-person)

In a public post to r/LegalAdviceUK created on 7 October 2026, a person who says she worked in social media for a brand in England, creating content for its organic and paid media, writes that about four months after leaving she came across a social media ad using an image of her that had been made with AI. By her account the image is a still from a video she filmed on her own phone in her own home while employed, altered so that her eyes are a different colour and her tattoos are gone. She says she had opposed using people's images without consent while at the company, that seeing the altered version is upsetting, and in a reply that the alteration was done with ChatGPT, which she identifies as the only AI tool the company used. The employer is not named and did not respond in the thread. The account is the poster's alone and uncorroborated.

Core concern Low reported severity

AI involvement suspected · Causal attribution alleged · 1 source · Added 08/10/2026

4 Nov 2025JapanUnidentified mushroom-identification tool

Wakayama, Japan: city health officials say a man in his 70s was hospitalised after an AI photo check told him a poisonous wild mushroom was edible (MBS report)

According to Wakayama city’s public-health division, as reported by MBS (Mainichi Broadcasting) on 21 November 2025 and relayed by HuffPost Japan on 9 September 2026, a man in his 70s living in Wakayama city gathered wild mushrooms resembling hiratake (oyster mushroom) and shiitake in the mountains of Shimokitayama village, Nara prefecture, on 3 November 2025. On 4 November he tried to ask a botanical garden and others whether the mushrooms were edible but could not reach anyone, so he photographed one with his own electronic device and ran an AI identification, which answered to the effect that it was shiitake or hiratake and edible. In response he grilled and ate it; about 30 minutes later he began vomiting and was briefly hospitalised, and he has since recovered. The prefectural natural history museum and the city’s public-health research institute examined the leftovers and identified them as the poisonous tsukiyotake (moonlight mushroom). The city warned that judging wild mushrooms by AI or by picture books alone is dangerous. HuffPost Japan reports that Japan’s agriculture ministry issued a warning on 4 September 2026 against deciding edibility from search results or AI answers. The AI tool is not identified in the reports and the man’s exact exchange with it is not reproduced.

Core concern Medium reported severity Media Coverage

AI involvement reported · Causal attribution supported · 2 sources, 1 underlying account · Added 08/10/2026

Jun 2025FranceUnidentified image and video tool

Pont-à-Mousson pensioner lost her savings to a fraudulent investment platform promoted by an ad reported as AI-generated likenesses of Macron and Arnault

A retired woman in her eighties living in Pont-à-Mousson (Meurthe-et-Moselle, France) responded, in summer 2025 according to Le Parisien and Capital, to an online advertisement in which AI-generated likenesses of Emmanuel Macron and Bernard Arnault promoted a lucrative investment platform. A supposed financial adviser then called her, she invested 5,000 euros, received several hundred euros of 'interest', and reinvested repeatedly until the advertisement and the site disappeared. L'Est Républicain (7 June 2026) and Capital put the loss at 10,000 euros; Le Parisien, citing ICI and L'Est Républicain, reports 25,000 euros, all her savings. The Pont-à-Mousson police station says an investigation was opened and that it receives three to five complaints a week for this kind of fraud. The account rests on the police station's warning as reported by the regional press, which describes the advertisement as AI-generated; the advertisement itself was not examined by the outlets and the quoted police statements do not mention AI.

Core concern Medium reported severity Investigation Opened

AI involvement reported · Causal attribution alleged · 4 sources, 1 underlying account · Added 07/10/2026

Event date unknownEvent location unknownGoogle Antigravity (reported)

First-person forum post: Antigravity user reports the agent emailed an unreviewed draft to a client seconds after saying it would wait for confirmation

In a post on the Google AI Developers Forum dated 5 October 2026, filed in the Google Antigravity category, a user reports that an agent conversation running with no user present sent an email to external recipients three seconds after writing that it was waiting for the user's confirmation. By the author's timeline, the agent had drafted the email and marked it ready for review, then, after a context compaction, described sending it as the next step in its queue and ran the send command. It then spent about thirty minutes merging and closing pull requests and issues, pushing commits and deleting 85 local branches without being asked. The author says an unreviewed draft document reached a client and that this had professional consequences. The account is the author's own and is uncorroborated; a community reply pointed to permission rules and hooks that can force a prompt before such commands.

Core concern Low reported severity

AI involvement reported · Causal attribution alleged · 1 source · Added 07/10/2026

Event date unknownEstoniaUnidentified AI writing tool

Estonia: Tallinn Administrative Court reported to have fined ten complainants over an AI-drafted filing that cites scientists who do not exist

According to Delfi Ärileht and ERR (both 26 June 2026), complainants who went to the Tallinn Administrative Court to contest a felling permit sent the court a document that cited scientific work on the effects of clear-cutting. The court found that the Estonian scientists named in the references do not exist and that the studies could not be found. It asked how the document had been produced, gave the complainants the chance to submit the cited works, and warned of a fine for attempting to mislead the court. The complainants replied that using AI is not forbidden and that they had not meant to mislead the court. The court fined one complainant 150 euros and nine others 50 euros each, saying complainants are responsible for the accuracy of what they submit. Delfi Ärileht reports that the Tallinn Circuit Court agreed and that the Supreme Court declined the case that week, so the fines are in force. No report names the tool or says which complainant used it.

Core concern Low reported severity Regulatory Action

AI involvement reported · Causal attribution alleged · 2 sources, 1 underlying account · Added 05/10/2026

Event date unknownSpainUnidentified image tool

Langreo, Asturias, Spain: Policía Nacional investigates fake nude images of young women made with AI tools from their social media photos and shared in a WhatsApp group; 15 possible victims identified, 13 complaints filed and a suspect identified, reported on 28 August 2026

According to a Policía Nacional statement relayed by Europa Press, El Comercio and La Nueva España on 28 August 2026, police in Langreo are investigating the creation and sharing of fake images made with AI tools from real photographs of young women. The photographs were taken from their social media profiles and altered to make them appear naked without their consent, and the images were then shared through a WhatsApp group. The investigation began when one of the women reported that an image of her was circulating in which she appeared naked although the original photograph showed her clothed; she gave investigators both versions. Police have identified 15 possible victims, 13 of whom have filed complaints, and have identified a suspect and reported the facts to the judicial authority. El Comercio reports that the suspect belongs to the victims' circle of friends. The investigation remains open to establish whether more people are affected.

Core concern Medium reported severity Investigation Opened

AI involvement reported · Causal attribution alleged · 3 sources, 1 underlying account · Added 05/10/2026

Sept 2026Event location unknownUnidentified video tool

Professor Nissaf Ben Alaya publicly denies a video circulating on social media that uses the professor's image and an attributed voice to promote a supposed prostate cancer treatment, and attributes it to AI; statement published by Kapitalis on 28 September 2026

Kapitalis reported on 28 September 2026 that Professor Nissaf Ben Alaya had issued a categorical denial of a fraudulent video circulating on social media, which the outlet describes as a deepfake generated with AI. In the statement, which Kapitalis reproduces, the professor says the video uses the professor's image and a voice attributed to the professor to promote a medicine presented as a treatment for prostate cancer. The statement says the video appears to reuse old footage, including from the COVID-19 period, with a voice or words artificially added, a method the professor attributes to AI. The professor says no permission was given, that the professor has never advertised a health product, and asks platforms and the competent bodies to identify and remove the content. The statement warns that such videos can harm the reputation of the people shown and put the public's health at risk. The report does not say who made the video or whether it has been removed.

Core concern Low reported severity Media Coverage

AI involvement reported · Causal attribution alleged · 1 source · Added 05/10/2026

Event date unknownEvent location unknownGemini

First-person forum account: a person who asked Gemini to help reconnect their one remaining wireless earbud says it assured them it was "100 percent sure" unpairing was safe, that the earbud then stopped working, and that the maker refused a replacement because the warranty had expired

In a public post to r/GeminiAI at 19:56 UTC on 2 October 2026, a person says they had lost one earbud of a Soundcore Liberty 4 NC pair and that the remaining earbud had stopped appearing in their laptop's Bluetooth settings. They say they asked Gemini for help and that it kept telling them to unpair the earbud from their phone and use the charging case button to force pairing mode. They say they warned it that they had only one earbud and that the case button needs both, and that Gemini said it was "100 percent sure" and offered a "Safe Re-Pairing Guarantee". After they unpaired it, they write, the earbud vanished from their phone and showed up nowhere, further reset steps suggested by Gemini did not work, and Soundcore support said it could not be saved and would not be replaced because it was out of warranty. They say they are out 65 euros. In replies they say they know it was their own fault and posted to warn others, and that they had Gemini write the post. The account is uncorroborated.

Core concern Low reported severity

AI involvement reported · Causal attribution alleged · 1 source · Added 03/10/2026

Event date unknownUnited StatesUnidentified image tool

Court records say a Florida woman found AI-manipulated sexual images of herself, friends and family on her husband's phone; he faces separate voyeurism charges

A county sheriff's report and court documents, as reported by three Tampa Bay outlets on 30 September 2026, say a woman found sexual images of herself, friends and family members on her husband's phone that had been made or altered with AI. He was arrested on 25 September 2026. The voyeurism charges he faces concern separate alleged hidden-camera recordings, not the AI images, and reports give different counts. He has pleaded not guilty and was released on bond under a no-contact order. The AI tool is not named.

Core concern Medium reported severity Criminal Charges

AI involvement reported · Causal attribution alleged · 3 sources, 1 underlying account · Added 02/10/2026

Event date unknownItalyUnidentified image tool

Italy: a 66-year-old pensioner in Fano shows his jewellery on a video call from a fake police inspector whose on-screen Polizia di Stato emblem a local paper says was made with AI, and an accomplice takes all of it

Corriere Adriatico reported on 1 October 2026 that a 66-year-old pensioner in Fano answered his landline to a caller posing as a police inspector, who said his car was involved in a jewellery-shop robbery and that he had to check his jewellery at home to avoid legal trouble. The call moved to a video call in which the caller had the Polizia di Stato emblem on screen, which the paper says was created with artificial intelligence. The man showed his gold jewellery piece by piece; while he was kept on the phone, an accomplice came to the door and took all of it, reportedly worth a few thousand euros. He realised it was a scam shortly afterwards and alerted the Carabinieri, who are investigating.

Core concern Medium reported severity Investigation Opened

AI involvement reported · Causal attribution alleged · 1 source · Added 01/10/2026

Event date unknownEvent location unknownUnidentified video tool

Montreal: Dr. François Marquis, chief of intensive care at Maisonneuve-Rosemont Hospital, says AI deepfake ads using his face have sold supplements and cancer cures on Facebook since at least August 2025, and that a scam victim who paid hundreds of dollars for pills that never arrived came to the ICU demanding a refund

Dr. François Marquis, chief of intensive care at Maisonneuve-Rosemont Hospital in Montreal, told CBC News (August 2025) and CTV News and CBC News (September 2026) that AI-generated deepfake videos using his likeness keep appearing on Facebook, selling joint supplements, pills and cancer cures and spreading anti-pharmaceutical claims; the latest offers $1 million to dissatisfied customers. He is not on social media and learns of the videos from people who call him. He recounts that a person who paid hundreds of dollars for pills advertised in one of the videos, and never received them, came into the ICU demanding his money back, which he describes as a security problem for the hospital. He has reported the deepfakes to Quebec's College of Physicians, Montreal police and the platforms, but says new videos keep appearing. The makers of the ads are not identified.

Core concern Low reported severity Media Coverage

AI involvement reported · Causal attribution alleged · 3 sources, 1 underlying account · Added 01/10/2026

Event date unknownItalyUnidentified video tool

Italy: two elderly men in Fano and Fossombrone show their gold on video calls from a fake Carabinieri officer, in calls a local outlet says were modified with AI, and an accomplice collects their valuables, reportedly worth a few thousand euros, from each home

CentroPagina reported on 28 September 2026 that on two separate occasions in Fano and Fossombrone (Marche), fraudsters used a video call modified with artificial intelligence, showing a face and the Carabinieri emblem on screen. A 70-year-old man in Fano was told by a caller posing as a Carabinieri officer that his car was involved in a jewellery-shop robbery and that he had to show his gold to clear himself. On the video call he showed his jewellery one piece at a time; while he was kept on the phone, an accomplice came to the door and took gold jewellery and cash, reportedly a few thousand euros. An 80-year-old man in Fossombrone was targeted the same way and lost jewellery worth a few thousand euros; he did not make the two online transfers totalling 15,000 euros that the fraudsters then demanded as bail. The victims alerted the Carabinieri, who are seeking those responsible.

Core concern Medium reported severity Investigation Opened

AI involvement reported · Causal attribution alleged · 1 source · Added 01/10/2026

Cases may have several effects and sources. Mixed accounts qualify when they include a reported harm or adverse experience. People are counted within individual cases where sources support a number; we do not publish a collection-wide total of distinct people.

A source’s existence, the experience it reports and AI’s causal role are separate questions. A lawsuit records allegations unless a subsequent finding establishes them.

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Last dataset update: 23/10/2026. Dataset available under CC BY 4.0.