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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 is wider: it also records consequential decisions and claims about people. Each account is reviewed for publication; claims may remain uncorroborated or disputed. How we review and count cases

In this selection

Published cases
5
Countries with reported events
3
Located 4 of 5 cases · 1 unknown
Languages in checked sources
4
Recorded for 5 of 5 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.

No known event years in this selection.

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5 of 404 published cases

Event date unknownEvent location unknownUnidentified image tool

Qingdao, China: online posts allege a Qingdao University graduate student used AI to generate and circulate nude images of her boyfriend's ex-girlfriend; police say the woman reported and a criminal investigation has been opened, and the posts' claim that the student was detained is unconfirmed

Modern Express reported on 24 September 2026 that online posts accused a female graduate student at Qingdao University of using AI, over a relationship dispute, to generate nude images of her boyfriend's ex-girlfriend and circulate them, and said the student had been criminally detained. A staff member at the Shibei branch of the Qingdao Public Security Bureau told the paper that the victim had reported the matter, that the case met the conditions for filing and that an investigation had been opened, declining to give details. A staff member of the university's Art College said the college had received a report and that the student had graduated in June. The victim told the reporter she was cooperating with the police and awaiting the result. The AI generation, the circulation and the detention are stated only in the online posts; police confirmed only that a case was opened. All accounts derive from the single Modern Express report, read through relays.

Core concern Medium reported severity Investigation Opened

AI involvement reported · Causal attribution alleged · 4 sources, 1 underlying account · Added 28/09/2026

Event date unknownIndiaUnidentified image tool

Sonbhadra (Uttar Pradesh): police say a retired official was pressured into transferring about Rs 2.36 crore over one to one-and-a-half months by extortionists who posed as judicial and government officials and used AI-made fake nude images to threaten him; three arrested after a bank manager's alert (September 2026)

Sonbhadra police say a retired official in Uttar Pradesh transferred about Rs 2.36 crore into accounts named by extortionists, including money raised through a loan, before a State Bank of India manager noticed the repeated transfers on 22 September 2026 and alerted the cyber crime police station. At a press briefing on 25 September the superintendent of police said the fraudsters had frightened the man by invoking the higher judiciary and senior government officials (a so-called digital arrest) and had used AI to create fake obscene or nude images to blackmail him with threats of defamation and harm to his family (Times of India, Amar Ujala, ETV Bharat, Newstrack). Police froze about Rs 75 lakh, registered an FIR and arrested three people, including the alleged organiser; the outlets relay one police account, and they describe the AI element differently (images of the victim, or images sent to him during a WhatsApp chat with someone posing as a woman).

Core concern High reported severity Investigation Opened

AI involvement reported · Causal attribution alleged · 4 sources, 1 underlying account · Added 27/09/2026

Event date unknownIndiaUnidentified video tool

Bansdih, Ballia (Uttar Pradesh): a father reports that a local youth made a fake Instagram account in his 17-year-old daughter's name and an AI-generated obscene video from her photograph, sent it to her classmates, friends and relatives, and threatened to kill the family when they objected; police register a case under the IT Act (22-23 September 2026)

The father of a 17-year-old Class 12 student in Bansdih, Ballia district, Uttar Pradesh, gave the Bansdih police a written complaint that a young man from the town, a former schoolmate who had been expelled from the school and bore a grudge against the family, took screenshots of his daughter's social-media account, created a fake Instagram ID in her name with a matching photograph, used AI technology to make an obscene video from her photo and circulated it to her classmates, friends and relatives; the complaint says the youth had earlier made two fake accounts using her and her mother's photographs and threatened to kill the whole family and to spread the video further when they objected (Dainik Bhaskar, Hindustan). The father submitted screenshots of the fake account and his daughter's mark-sheet as proof of her age. The station house officer said a case had been ordered registered and the investigation begun; Jagran reports the case under the Information Technology Act. The reports give no dates for the fake accounts, the video or its circulation; September 2026 is the month of the complaint (about 21-22 September) and of the circulation and threats the family describes as continuing, so the event date is recorded as unknown. The family is described as frightened. No arrest is reported.

Core concern High reported severity Involving minors Investigation Opened

AI involvement reported · Causal attribution alleged · 4 sources · Added 26/09/2026

Event date unknownSpainUnidentified image tool

Logroño: the Guardia Civil investigates a 14-year-old who took photographs of nine underage classmates from their public social-media profiles, used AI tools to strip and sexualise them, and uploaded the fake images to an adult pornography website under a profile describing them as girls from his school made with AI, organised in folders with each girl's personal details; the images reached about 40,000 views before removal (reported 14 July 2026)

On 14 July 2026 Spain's Interior Ministry published a Guardia Civil release stating that a 14-year-old from Logroño was under investigation as the presumed author of offences of discovery and disclosure of secrets, corruption of minors and child pornography. Investigators from the technology investigation team (EDITE) and Equipo@ found that he knew all nine victims, all minors and classmates, followed them on social media, took their photographs from the public content of their profiles without consent, and used artificial-intelligence tools to manipulate the images, digitally undress and sexualise them. He uploaded the fake pornographic material to an adult pornography website, created a profile there describing the content as girls from his school made with AI, and organised it in individual folders with each victim's personal data, which the Guardia Civil says made the girls recognisable and multiplied the emotional and social harm. Before the content could be removed it had reached about 40,000 views, amplifying the harm to the nine girls' privacy within hours. The proceedings were passed to the juvenile prosecutor under the juvenile criminal responsibility law; the release notes that parents or guardians are jointly liable for moral damages. Diario de León (Europa Press, 26 July) placed the case in a series of Spanish school cases since Almendralejo in 2023 and, unlike the release, described the minor as having been arrested.

Core concern High reported severity Involving minors Investigation Opened

AI involvement reported · Causal attribution supported · 3 sources, 1 underlying account · Added 23/09/2026

Event date unknownUnited KingdomUnidentified video tool

Ards and North Down, Northern Ireland: a person lost £250,000 to an investment fraud that began with an AI-generated video of a well-known financial personality

On 7 September 2026 the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) said a person in the Ards and North Down area had lost £250,000 in what it called a 'sophisticated and substantial' investment fraud. The victim first saw what appeared to be an AI-generated online video featuring a well-known personality from the financial sector promoting an investment with significant returns. After investing a small amount the victim was contacted on WhatsApp and encouraged to pay more, persuaded to open multiple online accounts, to allow the fraudsters remote access to a computer 'to assist with the investment', to borrow money to keep investing, and finally to make further payments to 'release' funds supposedly held in the investment. The PSNI did not name the personality; BBC News NI noted that fabricated endorsements of financial experts such as Martin Lewis, Peter Jones and Steven Bartlett circulate online.

Core concern High reported severity Investigation Opened

AI involvement reported · Causal attribution supported · 3 sources, 1 underlying account · Added 18/09/2026

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: 30/09/2026. Dataset available under CC BY 4.0.