{"id":282722,"date":"2026-01-13T21:54:07","date_gmt":"2026-01-13T21:54:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/282722\/"},"modified":"2026-01-13T21:54:07","modified_gmt":"2026-01-13T21:54:07","slug":"grainne-seoige-calls-on-government-to-pass-law-criminalising-ai-generated-fake-nude-images-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/282722\/","title":{"rendered":"Gr\u00e1inne Seoige calls on Government to pass law criminalising AI-generated fake nude images \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Gr\u00e1inne Seoige<\/a>, the former TV presenter and one-time election candidate, has called on politicians to conduct an urgent review of apps that allow \u201csexual abuse imagery\u201d to be made and shared online. <\/p>\n

Ms Seoige has previously spoken about how a \u201cdeepfake\u201d non-consensual intimate image of her generated by AI<\/a> was widely shared online during her unsuccessful general election campaign in 2024. <\/p>\n

She is calling for an \u201cemergency review\u201d and a law that would clearly criminalise AI-generated fake non-consensual intimate images. <\/p>\n

She has also offered to give evidence to the Oireachtas about the effect the abuse had on her. <\/p>\n

Ms Seoige, who ran for Fianna F\u00e1il<\/a> in Galway West, said garda\u00ed had not been able to process an investigation into the generation of the image of her, despite the fact that sharing an intimate image without someone\u2019s consent, including an AI generated image, has been a crime since 2020.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat we are seeing now is a system that is not victim-focused,\u201d Ms Seoige told The Irish Times in a statement after writing to Government Ministers about her concerns. <\/p>\n

\u201cAI apps can generate sexual imagery of real people in seconds, and messaging platforms can distribute it at scale within minutes \u2013 yet the law allows everyone involved to pass the buck while the victim is left exposed.\u201d<\/p>\n

[\u00a0Social media pressure and fake videos undermining democracy, Taoiseach saysOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

She said the recent controversy around allegedly illegal images generated by Grok<\/a>, the AI tool owned by billionaire Elon Musk<\/a> and the \u201cunchecked spread of material\u201d through apps such as WhatsApp<\/a>, owned by Meta<\/a>, \u201chave exposed serious failures in existing law, regulation and platform responsibility\u201d.<\/p>\n

Ms Seoige has formally complained to Meta, whose European headquarters are based in Ireland, about their \u201cslow, procedural and inadequate\u201d responses to her case. <\/p>\n

She has written to the Oireachtas media committee, Minister for Justice Jim O\u2019Callaghan and Minister for Media Patrick O\u2019Donovan calling for \u201curgent action on AI apps and messaging platforms enabling sexual abuse imagery\u201d.<\/p>\n

She said there needed to be better legislation at both national and European level. She is seeking \u201can urgent review of the legislative gaps exposed by AI-enabled sexual abuse imagery\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis legislation cannot be written in the abstract,\u201d Ms Seoige said. <\/p>\n

\u201cThose drafting it need to hear directly from people who have lived through this \u2013 the fear, the humiliation and the lasting impact.\u201d<\/p>\n

She has also written to the Garda Commissioner and to the media regulator, Coimisi\u00fan na Me\u00e1n, and has lobbied women TDs and Senators in Fianna F\u00e1il to support her campaign for stronger laws. <\/p>\n

A spokesman for Mr O\u2019Donovan said the Minister has not yet seen the letter from Ms Seoige but is aware that it was sent to him and other ministers or politicians. \u201cHe will of course consider the issues raised in the letter but would note that Government is already examining this matter.\u201d<\/p>\n

Taoiseach Miche\u00e1l Martin told the D\u00e1il on Tuesday that he was convening a meeting of relevant Government Ministers and the Attorney General about Grok to develop a \u201cfully co-ordinated response\u201d.<\/p>\n

Mr Martin said the Attorney General was providing legal advice and if there were any gaps in existing AI legislation they would be \u201caddressed quickly\u201d.<\/p>\n

He told Social Democrats leader Holly Cairns any investigation of illegality was \u201ca matter for the investigating authorities\u201d. <\/p>\n

He was not aware of any specific Garda investigation but added that the Garda \u201cdon\u2019t alert us to every investigation\u201d that is under way.<\/p>\n

Ms Cairns said social media company X, owner of Grok, can be prosecuted under the Child Trafficking and Pornography Act because of the proliferation of thousands of sexualised images of women and children online.<\/p>\n

She said the Government\u2019s response to the scandal was \u201cso muted and confusing\u201d with Mr O\u2019Donovan stating responsibility for creation of these images lies with users, while Minister of State for AI Niamh Smyth said X was breaking the law and enforcement action should be taken against X and Grok.<\/p>\n

Ms Cairns had highlighted some of the \u201cvile prompts\u201d given to Grok, including \u201cput her in a bikini and rub her down with baby oil\u201d and \u201creplace her bikini with dental floss\u201d, which had generated thousands of sexually abusive images online.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese images are not a mistake. This is the model working as intended,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n

Last year new edit features were added to make it easy to undress people in photographs. <\/p>\n

\u201cIncredibly, no thought was apparently given to how this tool be used and weaponised against women,\u201d said Ms Cairns. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe company didn\u2019t even bother to include age restrictions to prevent child sexual abuse imagery being generated.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Gr\u00e1inne Seoige, the former TV presenter and one-time election candidate, has called on politicians to conduct an urgent…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":282723,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[289,9,10,34888,18,1647,13,14,4771,108893,5066,6,19,17,26735,11,12,15,16,1722,5,36103,7,8,4635,879],"class_list":{"0":"post-282722","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-artificial-intelligence","9":"tag-breaking-news","10":"tag-breakingnews","11":"tag-coimisiun-na-mean","12":"tag-eire","13":"tag-elon-musk","14":"tag-featured-news","15":"tag-featurednews","16":"tag-fianna-fail","17":"tag-grainne-seoige","18":"tag-grok","19":"tag-headlines","20":"tag-ie","21":"tag-ireland","22":"tag-jim-ocallaghan","23":"tag-latest-news","24":"tag-latestnews","25":"tag-main-news","26":"tag-mainnews","27":"tag-meta","28":"tag-news","29":"tag-patrick-o-donovan","30":"tag-top-stories","31":"tag-topstories","32":"tag-whatsapp","33":"tag-x"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/115890019754526950","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/282722","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=282722"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/282722\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/282723"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=282722"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=282722"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=282722"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}