The number of deep and AI-generated child abuse images is doubling every six months, the director of the National Crime Agency has warned.
The next five years will see a ‘significant increase’ in the creation of indecent images using artificial intelligence, says Alex Murray.
The images were created by software that learned from real-life child abuse photos and videos, Mr Murray, who is also AI lead for the National Police Chiefs Council, added.
“What we’re seeing now is that in six months, the number of fake images of child abuse on the internet has doubled,” he said.
‘So this means that we as the police have to be very quick in this place.’
Artificially created indecent images are illegal in the same way as real children.
And it’s a misconception that the image of abuse the software creates doesn’t affect real victims, Mr Murray said.
“We need to remember that models are trained on data, in order for models to create images of child abuse, they need to be trained on actual child abuse,” he said.
The number of deep and AI-generated child abuse images online doubles every six months, Britain’s FBI warns (Stock photo)
Hugh Nelson confesses to detectives after using AI to create indecent images of real children
Nelson used available AI technology to transform photographs of real children into scenes of physical and sexual abuse before selling the images online, for around £5,000.
‘So you will have a video of children being abused, the model will learn from that and reproduce the image so that there is a real victim.
‘And there’s always the sociological question of whether putting child abuse material into contact offending.’
Mr. Murray said it was not possible to know exactly how many such images were created and published online, but many were ‘thousands and thousands and thousands.’
As technology improves it will become more difficult to distinguish AI-generated images of abuse from the real thing and it will become more common, he said.
“The people who use this software are still quite niche, but the fact is that it has become very easy, so ease of entry, realism and availability are three vectors that may increase,” Murray said.
Last month, a film-maker who used AI to create indecent images of children was jailed for 18 years over footage of him admitting he had a ‘warped’ mind.
Hugh Nelson said he provided a ‘valuable service’ by taking ‘commissions’ from relatives and family friends of children – charging £80 to turn real-life pictures of children into 3D ‘characters’ who were physically and sexually abused.
Neil Darlington (pictured) was sent pictures of fully clothed girls and then used AI to manipulate the pictures to be sexually explicit before threatening to send them to his family and friends.
The next five years will see a ‘significant increase’ in the creation of indecent images using artificial intelligence, it has been said (File image)
The police published a Powerpoint presentation with mock-up images of the AI ​​face transfer technology used by Hugh Nelson
The 27-year-old was shown on camera admitting to detectives that his behavior had been ‘really strange’ after being confronted with evidence of a ‘sick’ fake factory.
Operating from his family home near Bolton, Nelson uses AI technology to manipulate genuine photographs of innocent children as young as four into scenes of child abuse, rape and abuse – making around £5,000 but giving them away to others for free.
In August, Neil Darlington, which is used AI to make indecent images of children to try and blackmail them has been sentenced to three years.
52-year-old sent pictures full of clothes from girls. He then used AI to manipulate the images to be sexually explicit before threatening to send them to his family and friends.
However, Darlington does not know that the young girls who are trying to blackmail him are actually police officers in disguise.
Darlington was jailed for a year in June after admitting 10 offenses at Stoke Crown Court including making indecent images of children and blackmailing two girls believed to be aged 11 and 14, who he had met on a chat room.
The Attorney General referred Darlington’s sentence to the Court of Appeal, arguing that it was ‘unduly lenient’, with three judges increasing the prison term to one of three years and placing him on the offender register indefinitely.
