Muah.AI is a website where people can make AI girlfriends—chatbots that will talk via text or voice and send images of themselves by request. Nearly

The Age of AI Child Abuse Is Here

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2024-10-19 06:00:03

Muah.AI is a website where people can make AI girlfriends—chatbots that will talk via text or voice and send images of themselves by request. Nearly 2 million users have registered for the service, which describes its technology as “uncensored.” And, judging by data purportedly lifted from the site, people may be using its tools in their attempts to create child-sexual-abuse material, or CSAM.

Last week, Joseph Cox, at 404 Media, was the first to report on the data set, after an anonymous hacker brought it to his attention. What Cox found was profoundly disturbing: He reviewed one prompt that included language about orgies involving “newborn babies” and “young kids.” This indicates that a user had asked Muah.AI to respond to such scenarios, although whether the program did so is unclear. Major AI platforms, including ChatGPT, employ filters and other moderation tools intended to block generation of content in response to such prompts, but less prominent services tend to have fewer scruples.

People have used AI software to generate sexually exploitative images of real individuals. Earlier this year, pornographic deepfakes of Taylor Swift circulated on X and Facebook. And child-safety advocates have warned repeatedly that generative AI is now being widely used to create sexually abusive imagery of real children, a problem that has surfaced in schools across the country.