Millions of children and teenagers around the world are victims of deepfakes. UNICEF: More and more children are becoming victims of sexually explicit deepfakes Human rights
Approximately every 25th child becomes a victim of criminals who create sexualized deepfakes. This conclusion was reached by employees of the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), the international organization ECPAT and Interpol. They conducted a joint study in 11 countries.
At least 1.2 million children said their images were manipulated and turned into sexually explicit deepfakes. To highlight the scale of the problem, UNICEF makes a comparison: it is as if in every school class there was a child who had become a victim of such a crime.
Deepfakes—photos, videos or audio files created or processed using artificial intelligence (AI) that look or sound like the real thing—are increasingly being used to create sexualized content involving children.
Children themselves are well aware of this risk. In some countries involved in the study, about two-thirds of children said they were concerned that AI could be used to create fake sexual images or videos.
Creating deepfakes with sexual content is tantamount to child abuse, UNICEF emphasizes. Fake videos and photographs of this nature normalize the sexual exploitation of children and fuel the demand for violent content.
“UNICEF welcomes the efforts of AI developers who are implementing security-by-default approaches and robust safeguards to prevent misuse of their systems,” the fund said.
However, many AI models are developed without proper safety mechanisms. The risks can be compounded when generative AI tools are embedded directly into social media platforms where processed images are quickly shared.
UNICEF calls on all countries to criminalize the creation, acquisition, storage and distribution of AI-generated content containing sexualized images of children.
AI developers must implement security approaches at the design stage. All digital companies must prevent the spread of AI-generated child sexual abuse material, rather than simply removing it after the abuse has already occurred, UNICEF stresses.