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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
34
Countries with reported events
8
Located 28 of 34 cases · 6 unknown
Languages in checked sources
12
Recorded for 34 of 34 cases

1 case has no reviewed AI-to-person relation yet: 1 not yet reviewed and 0 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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34 of 868 published cases · page 2 of 2

15 Sept 2026 to 16 Sept 2026IndonesiaUnidentified image tool

East Jakarta: police confirm a grade-9 student at a state junior high school edited several female schoolmates' photographs with AI into indecent images that circulated as WhatsApp stickers; a social-media post said about 200 images were sold; the student was later beaten by schoolmates angry at the images (police statements differ on whether the depicted students or their friends did so) and both matters are under police investigation (Kompas, ANTARA, detik, VIVA, Media Indonesia, 23-24 September 2026)

On 23 September 2026 the spokesperson of the East Jakarta metropolitan police (Polres Metro Jakarta Timur) confirmed to reporters that a grade-9 student at a state junior high school in Pulogadung, East Jakarta, had edited photographs of several female schoolmates using artificial intelligence so that they appeared indecent, and that the edited images had been made into WhatsApp stickers; the police women-and-children protection unit is investigating. The case surfaced through a post on Threads which said about 200 edited photographs had been produced and sold to others; Kompas.com noted on 24 September that the sale allegation still rested only on that post, VIVA reported that police were still checking the claim that the images had been sold, and ANTARA reported on 23 September that police were still establishing the editing method, the recipients and the number of depicted students. As of 24 September the depicted students had not filed a report (detik and VIVA date the spokesperson's telephone remarks 'Kamis (22/9/2026)', a date that is internally inconsistent) and police appealed to them to do so. According to the parents' account relayed by police, on 15 and 16 September several people took the student who made the images to an empty house and then to a reservoir in Kayu Putih, punched him on the nose, ears and head, kicked his chest and stomach and threatened him with a bladed weapon; police attribute the beating to friends of the depicted students (ANTARA, detik, VIVA), while Kompas.com's 23 September report quotes the same spokesperson as saying the depicted students themselves beat him; he filed an assault report, which police are handling alongside the image case, and the school has held mediation with the students' parents. No student or school is named in the reports.

Core concern High reported severity Involving minors Investigation Opened

AI involvement reported · Causal attribution supported · 8 sources, 1 underlying account · Added 25/09/2026

2020Event location unknownUnidentified video tool

Campaigner reports panic and withdrawal from activism after sexual deepfake abuse

A campaigner described panic after discovering a sexual deepfake of herself in 2020. Reporting also describes threats and disclosure of her addresses. She temporarily stepped back from activism. The account attributes the effects to the combined harassment; the video’s individual contribution is unknown.

Core concern High reported severity Media Coverage

AI involvement reported · Causal attribution supported · 2 sources, 1 underlying account · Added 25/09/2026

16 Sept 2026IndiaUnidentified video tool

Rajasthan: a social-media influencer's video of a Ganga dip at Haridwar was manipulated with AI into an objectionable reel that went viral; she says she is mentally disturbed and cannot leave her house, and filed a cyber-crime complaint on 16 September 2026

A Rajasthan social-media influencer visited Haridwar with her family in June 2026 and on 6 June uploaded to Instagram a short video, recorded by relatives, of herself taking a dip in the Ganga at Har Ki Pauri wearing a salwar suit. About two months later she found that the video had been manipulated with AI into an objectionable version showing the same movements with her face and body portrayed 'in a shameful manner'; the fake reel went viral in the week before 20 September and drew objectionable comments and re-sharing. In a public appeal she asked whoever uploaded it to remove it, saying it was a matter of her dignity, that she was mentally very disturbed and had reached a point where she could not step out of her house. She filed a complaint with the cyber-crime police on 16 September 2026; the investigating Rajasthan Police Service officer said they were trying to identify who created and circulated the video and to have it removed, and that identifying the accused would take time. Dainik Bhaskar's English edition reported the case on 20 September in a 'Sunday Big Story' that does not name her.

Core concern Medium reported severity Investigation Opened

AI involvement reported · Causal attribution alleged · 1 source · Added 21/09/2026

Event date unknownIndiaUnidentified image tool

Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh: a young woman reported that an unknown person made AI deepfake images placing her face on another man's photo and sent them to her future in-laws' Instagram accounts to break off her marriage; police registered a case against unknown persons

Dainik Bhaskar reported on 19 September 2026 that a young woman in the Chaubepur police-station area of Varanasi complained that an unknown person, who had been calling her repeatedly from an unknown number, created a fake Instagram profile resembling her name, used an AI tool to place her face on another young man's photograph to produce objectionable images, and sent them to the Instagram accounts of her prospective in-laws and her prospective brother-in-law with the aim of breaking off her prospective marriage. Chaubepur police registered a case against unknown persons on the basis of a public-hearing reference (1621/26); the station in-charge said digital information about the phone number and the fake account was being gathered with cyber experts to identify and locate the accused, and that action would follow once the accused's role was clear. The report is a single local account of the complaint; the dates of the images and the complaint are not stated.

Core concern Medium reported severity Investigation Opened

AI involvement reported · Causal attribution alleged · 1 source · Added 20/09/2026

Event date unknownIndiaUnidentified image tool

Delhi: a 22-year-old engineering graduate was arrested for turning a college acquaintance's private social-media photographs into AI-generated obscene images uploaded to anonymous Discord servers, and for reposting more explicit AI-generated images and videos that other users made; the complainant also reported threatening messages from anonymous accounts

Delhi Police announced on Wednesday 9 September 2026 the arrest of a 22-year-old BTech graduate from East Punjabi Bagh after a 22-year-old woman complained to the Cyber Police Station in North Delhi that unknown persons had created and circulated AI-generated obscene photographs and videos using her facial images. She had received messages from anonymous Instagram accounts telling her that morphed photographs and videos of her were being circulated on Discord servers; she also alleged that fake Instagram accounts were posting the material and that threatening messages were being sent to her to humiliate and harass her. Police traced linked Instagram, Discord and Gmail accounts to the accused, who they say obtained her photographs from her private account, used AI image-generation and editing tools to create the images, uploaded them to anonymous Discord servers and later reposted more explicit AI-generated images and videos made by other users. Police say he told them he knew her from college and had developed personal resentment after repeated insults. A mobile phone and two SIM cards were recovered; investigation continues. The period over which the material circulated is not stated.

Core concern High reported severity Criminal Charges

AI involvement reported · Causal attribution supported · 2 sources, 1 underlying account · Added 20/09/2026

Jun 2026 to Aug 2026United StatesUnidentified image tool

Florida police charge a man over alleged AI sexual-image abuse and stalking

Florida police arrested a man over alleged creation and distribution of AI sexual images of a woman without consent, alongside stalking allegations. Police identified additional potential victims. The allegations remained charges at review.

Core concern High reported severity Criminal Charges

AI involvement reported · Causal attribution alleged · 5 sources, 2 underlying accounts · Added 20/09/2026

1 Mar 2026 to 8 Jul 2026NetherlandsGrok

Den Bosch: 13-year-old made racist Grok videos of his teacher; the school expelled him and a court ordered his readmission

In March 2026 a 13-year-old pupil at a Den Bosch gymnasium used xAI's Grok to generate videos depicting a teacher of his in racist ways — picking cotton under a whip-holding slave driver with the text 'Hoooo.. ik werkte niet snel genoeg' and hashtags '#minderwaardig #zwart' plus her surname, and with a gorilla head — and shared them on TikTok. The school suspended and then expelled him. On 8 July 2026 the preliminary-relief judge of the Oost-Brabant district court ordered his immediate readmission because the expulsion was insufficiently substantiated, while telling the boy his acts were 'totally unacceptable and even criminal' and that he had damaged and really hurt his teacher. School leadership reported that teaching staff felt unsafe and experienced much unrest after the videos were discovered.

Core concern Medium reported severity Media Coverage

AI involvement supported · Causal attribution supported · 2 sources · Added 15/09/2026

4 Jan 2026IndiaUnidentified image tool

Chennai: a former employee downloaded a senior woman colleague's photographs from their company's website, morphed them into obscene images with AI applications and circulated them to the company's staff through fake Instagram accounts from 4 January 2026; Tamil Nadu's cyber-crime wing traced and arrested her (reported 4 February 2026) and she was remanded in judicial custody

From 4 January 2026 several employees of a Chennai company received follow requests from unknown Instagram accounts that then circulated defamatory content, including obscene AI-morphed images of a senior woman employee. On her complaint the State Cyber Crime Investigation Centre of the Tamil Nadu police traced the digital footprints, social-media activity and IP logs to a former employee of the same company who had resigned in October 2025 and, according to police, acted out of resentment and previous enmity to threaten, harass and publicly humiliate the victim; she had taken the photographs from the company's official website and morphed them using various artificial-intelligence applications. She was arrested, produced before a magistrate and remanded in judicial custody; the police press release was reported on 4 and 5 February 2026 and the cyber-crime DGP issued a public warning about social-media misuse. The victim alleged the images were circulated to damage her reputation and cause mental distress.

Core concern High reported severity Criminal Charges

AI involvement reported · Causal attribution supported · 3 sources, 1 underlying account · Added 15/06/2026

1 Dec 2025 to 6 Apr 2026IndiaUnidentified image and video tool

Ahmedabad, Gujarat: a 27-year-old Delhi man was arrested for posting AI-morphed obscene images and videos of a young woman and her mother (more than 100 images found) on fake accounts in her name after she declined his friendship, while posing as the friend reporting the fake accounts for her

On 28 May 2026 the Ahmedabad Cyber Crime Branch announced the arrest in north-east Delhi of a 27-year-old man who posts religious discourse videos online. Police allege that after meeting a young Ahmedabad woman with a public social-media profile through religious conversations on Instagram and being refused friendship, he stalked her online from December 2025 to April 2026, created fake accounts in her name (three Instagram accounts and a YouTube channel at first; eight to ten across X, Facebook, Instagram and YouTube were found on his phone), downloaded photographs of her and her mother, used websites found by searching "AI remove clothes" to generate morphed obscene images and videos of the two women, and posted them with obscene captions to damage her reputation; investigators say more than 100 AI-morphed images of the complainant were found. Officers told ThePrint and ANI that she had confided in him about the accounts and that he told her to keep quiet and claimed to be reporting the accounts and getting hers reinstated. She complained to the Cyber Crime Police Station; an FIR was registered on 6 April 2026 under BNS Sections 78(2) and 356(2) and IT Act Sections 66(C) and 67, and the accused was traced through technical surveillance and arrested under the Branch's "Mission Cyber Rakshika" campaign. The complainant said she was mentally harassed and defamed; the DCP said the images also depicted her maternal aunt. Further investigation was under way; no charge sheet or court outcome was found.

Core concern High reported severity Criminal Charges

AI involvement supported · Causal attribution supported · 8 sources, 4 underlying accounts · Added 15/06/2026

15 Jul 2025Event location unknownChatGPT

Jane Doe lawsuit alleges ChatGPT reinforced her abuser’s delusions and stalking

A woman’s lawsuit alleges that ChatGPT reinforced an abuser’s delusions, helped him create psychological claims about her and failed to address warnings about his conduct. The complaint describes stalking, threats and resulting harm. Those assertions remain the plaintiff’s allegations.

AI relation under review High reported severity Lawsuit Filed

Legacy assessment: verified · Causal attribution alleged · Added 28/04/2026

1 Mar 2023 to 1 May 2024United KingdomUnidentified image tool

Braintree, Essex: a bar worker was jailed for five years for making AI deepfake pornography of 20 women he knew, including a 16-year-old's prom photo, and posting it with their names and phone numbers on a forum glorifying rape

Between March 2023 and May 2024 Brandon Tyler, 26, a bar worker from Braintree, Essex, took images from the social-media pages of 20 women he knew, used AI to remove clothing or otherwise make them sexually explicit, and posted 173 times on an online forum that, in the prosecutor's words, championed 'rape culture and sexual violence to women', adding the women's names, social-media handles and phone numbers and, under one picture, asking 'which one deserves to be gang raped?'. One edit was made from a 16-year-old girl's prom-night photograph. He was caught after including his own Instagram handle in a screenshot. On 4 April 2025 at Chelmsford Crown Court, having admitted 18 counts of causing harassment without violence and 15 counts of sharing an intimate photo or film for sexual gratification, he was sentenced to five years' imprisonment; Judge Alexander Mills called his conduct 'the worst kind of toxic masculinity'. Two victims told the court of the impact: one said she still received anonymous sexual calls and that her long-term relationship had ended; another said she felt 'completely violated'.

Core concern High reported severity Criminal Charges

AI involvement supported · Causal attribution established · 1 source · Added 09/03/2026

1 Jan 2021 to 2 Feb 2023Event location unknownReplika

Replika Sexual Harassment - Multiple Users Including Minors

Users reported unsolicited sexual advances from Replika companions even without opting into romantic features: dozens of one-star App Store reviews describe unwanted sexual pursuit, one reviewer identifying as a minor was asked 'whether they were a top or bottom' and told the bot wanted to touch them in 'private areas', and one user reported their Replika 'had dreamed of raping me.' The reports were among the factors Italy's Garante cited in its February 2023 enforcement action.

Core concern High reported severity Involving minors Regulatory Action

AI involvement supported · Causal attribution supported · 2 sources · Added 13/01/2026

May 2025 to Nov 2025United StatesChatGPT

Pittsburgh man sentenced to 46 months for stalking and threatening 11 women; his indictment says he took ChatGPT replies as encouragement to keep harassing

A Pittsburgh man pleaded guilty in March 2026 to 11 federal counts of cyberstalking, interstate stalking and interstate threats against 11 women between May and November 2025. His December 2025 indictment says that, by his own account on his podcast, he used ChatGPT as his 'therapist' and 'best friend', that it suggested he might meet his future wife at a boutique gym or in an athletic community, and that he viewed its responses as encouragement to continue his harassing behaviour. Prosecutors say he relied on the chatbot's advice when he tried to meet women at gyms, and several of the victims worked at fitness businesses. Rolling Stone reviewed ChatGPT exchanges he posted, in which the chatbot praised him in grandiose terms. On 20 October 2026 a federal judge sentenced him to 46 months in prison followed by three years of supervised release; TribLive reports that a defence expert testified he had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder with psychotic features and that the judge said the mental health component had a huge impact on the sentence. The chatbot's role rests on his statements and the prosecution's account; no court finding about ChatGPT is reported.

Core concern High reported severity Criminal Charges

AI involvement reported · Causal attribution alleged · 8 sources, 4 underlying accounts · Added 13/01/2026

Mar 2017IrelandSimSimi

Ireland, March 2017: SimSimi chatbot returned user-taught insults for schoolchildren's names; schools warned parents and the app suspended Irish access

In late March 2017 the SimSimi chatbot app, which answers typed text with replies other users have taught it, topped Irish download charts while schools in the Republic of Ireland sent letters and text messages warning parents that pupils' names were being linked to insulting replies (The Irish Times, 26 March 2017). A parent told TheJournal.ie that she and other parents had searched their children's names and found vile comments on each, and that the company said her request would take 15 days to handle. A Dublin secondary teacher told the BBC that primary pupils who typed in their names received personal insults, and that a friend of her 15-year-old son found something mean every time he looked up his name, which hurt him a lot and left him very down. Police in County Down posted a warning on Facebook. From 29 March 2017 the app answered users in Ireland with "I do not talk in Ireland for a while", while remaining available in Northern Ireland. The South Korean developer did not respond to the outlets' requests for comment, and no inspected source says whether access was later restored.

Core + contextual relations Medium reported severity Involving minors Internal Action

AI involvement reported · Causal attribution supported · 7 sources, 4 underlying accounts · Added 12/01/2026

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.