Experts' AI warning after schoolgirl photos targeted

Deepfake apps with the ability to impose women’s heads on naked bodies are being pushed on social media as experts warn more advanced software could be on the horizon.

Monash University associate professor Asher Flynn, who specialises in technology-facilitated violence, said tech giants should be responsible for hosting promotion of the apps.

“You can have these advertised on an Instagram feed and just it’ll be an app or a different website that you can go to where you can actually upload an image of any female,” she told AAP.

“Usually they’re just for women, so it will remove the clothing and replace it with female genitalia, breasts, and you’ve got a realistic, fake, sexualised image available.”

It follows the arrest of a teenage boy after manipulated images were shared of girls in years 9 to 12 at Bacchus Marsh Grammar, northwest of Melbourne.

Dr Flynn said not enough was being done to stamp out access to the software.

“This type of technology is new in the sense that we’re seeing escalation of it and the quality of the images that are being created,” she said.

“And it’s just becoming more accessible. Three years ago, you’d have to search for it and go to kind of the underground platforms to find it, now it’s readily available.”

Laws cracking down on the sharing of sexually explicit AI-generated images and deepfakes without consent were recently introduced to federal parliament.

However, concerns remain about the availability of online programs to create deepfake images.

University of Melbourne associate professor Toby Murray, who specialises in computer security, said he expects to see further developments in AI’s capabilities in the near future.

“If we are worried about deepfake images today, or deepfake voices today, then tomorrow we’re going to be more worried about deepfake videos,” he said.

“One of the other things that we’re now seeing is these technologies converging together, and people creating AI technology that are capable of pulling all (the features) together.”

Bacchus Marsh Grammar has said it is counselling students after it was made aware of the production and circulation of video content including images of about 50 students.

“Bacchus Marsh Grammar is taking this matter very seriously and has contacted Victoria Police,” acting principal Kevin Richardson said in a statement.

Victoria Police officers arrested the teenager over the explicit images circulated online and he was released pending further inquiries.

The investigation remains ongoing.