What happened

A small number of pupils at the Royal School Armagh created sexually explicit, AI-generated images of other students and shared them among peers. The co‑educational grammar school, which has around 800 pupils up to age 18, immediately referred the matter to education authorities and the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI). 

The school principal described the incident as “shocking” and “without excuse” and confirmed that victims and alleged perpetrators had been identified, with the number of pupils directly targeted said to be in “single figures,” though early reports suggested more. 

Although the images were fabricated, the victims experienced humiliation, anxiety, and reputational damage within their peer community. 

One of the victims reported that since being contacted by the police she had been too afraid to socialise or leave her home for non-essential reasons. She spent the 2025 Christmas period in isolation because she did not know if the perpetrator was someone within her immediate social circle.

The incident gained notoriety because it coincided with legislative efforts in the UK to make the creation of non-consensual intimate images a specific criminal offence. 

Why it happened

The incident reflects several converging factors, including broad accessible, cheap and easy to use deepfake and generative AI tools that many leading AI platforms fail to police reliably.

Furthermore, legal frameworks for AI-generated intimate image abuse are in many jurisdictions woefully inadequate, making accountability very challenging. Most frameworks are still evolving, especially when perpetrators are minors.

In addition, young people may not fully understand the legal and psychological consequences of creating or sharing manipulated explicit images.