Jenna Ortega has said she shut down her X (then Twitter) account after she got an “influx” of explicit images on the platform.
Ortega, 21, made the comments during a recent conversation on The New York Times’s “The Interview” podcast.
During the chat, she opened up on her feelings about artificial intelligence, saying that she had previously been sent AI-generated images of herself as a child on X.
“I hate AI,” Ortega said when asked to give her thoughts on the emerging technology, which can be used to create realistic images and videos, including deepfake pornography.
“Did I like being 14 and making a Twitter account because I was supposed to and seeing dirty edited content of me as a child? No. It’s terrifying. It’s corrupt. It’s wrong,” she said.
The former child actor, who rose to fame starring in the Disney Channel series “Stuck in the Middle” and CW comedy “Jane the Virgin,” said she was told to sign up to Twitter to build her image.
Eric McCandless / Disney Channel via Getty Images
“One of the first — actually the first D.M. that I ever opened myself when I was 12 was an unsolicited photo of a man’s genitals, and that was just the beginning of what was to come,” she added.
Ortega said that she ended up deleting the app “about two, three years ago” due to the “influx” of “absurd images and photos” she was receiving.
“It was disgusting, and it made me feel bad. It made me feel uncomfortable,” she continued. “Anyway, that’s why I deleted it, because I couldn’t say anything without seeing something like that.”
Ortega isn’t the first person to be targeted by those creating and disseminating realistic AI porn.
Earlier this year, Taylor Swift’s likeness was used in a series of sexually explicit posts that went viral on X.
X ended up temporarily blocking searches for the singer as a safety measure.
In a statement at the time, the company said: “Posting Non-Consensual Nudity (NCN) images is strictly prohibited on X and we have a zero-tolerance policy towards such content.”
“Our teams are actively removing all identified images and taking appropriate actions against the accounts responsible for posting them,” it added.
The incident led to calls for new legislation to combat the threats posed by deepfakes.
In 2023, Democratic Rep. Joseph Morelle proposed a bill that would make it a crime to intentionally share or threaten to share digitally altered images of an individual engaging in sexually explicit conduct.
The bill, titled the Preventing Deepfakes of Intimate Images Act, was referred to the House Committee on the Judiciary, but no further action has yet been taken.
“We’ve seen the devastating impacts intimate deepfakes images have had on everyone from young schoolgirls to world-wide celebrities,” Morelle has said on the topic. “We have a responsibility to take decisive action that puts a stop to these heinous crimes.”
