Your kid’s school is probably not teaching them how to use AI safely. Here’s what’s at stake

Most Schools Are Skipping the AI Safety Lesson Your Teen Needs — and the Risks Go Far Beyond Cheating

The Hidden Threat: Nude Deepfakes and Generative AI

Qwenews.com – Generative AI tools are now being used by more teenagers than most adults realize to produce explicit images and video. These so-called “nude deepfakes” are AI-generated pictures or clips that either depict pornography or make someone appear undressed. Because the phenomenon is still emerging, researchers have not yet mapped its long-term psychological toll on those affected, according to Dr. Chad Steel, an adjunct professor of digital forensics at George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia, who was not part of the research discussed below.

What is known, however, is that victims of child sexual abuse material can be tracked down or contacted by individuals who have accessed the content years later, Steel noted. Predators may also wield those images as leverage, threatening to forward them to a victim’s parents or friends unless monetary or other demands are met.

As I have cautioned before, once intimate images of someone land online, they can complicate dating prospects, hinder job searches, and elevate the risk of sexual assault, depression, and suicide.

“There is a fundamental underestimation and probably adult misconception about how often and how familiar adolescents are with using Gen AI,” Steel said, referring to generative AI.

Steel added that producing nude deepfakes has reached a threshold where it might “almost consider it normal behavior for adolescents.” He stressed that young people “certainly don’t understand how to protect themselves, and that these images may be permanent, and may be out there forever.”

What Schools Are Missing

A fresh survey conducted by Common Sense Media — a San Francisco–based nonprofit focused on children’s media and education — polled 13- to 17-year-olds and found that only 30 percent of teens reported a teacher had ever discussed how to use AI safely. The data point to a broader absence of classroom conversation around AI literacy: how the technology functions, how to verify whether a chatbot’s output is accurate, and how to navigate it without harm, explained study coauthor Michael Robb, head of research at the organization.

“For the most part, they’re just not happening yet,” said Robb.

Robb acknowledged two caveats. Students might simply be unaware of what is embedded in their school curricula, and Common Sense Media cannot yet gauge how effective AI instruction is for the small slice of teens who do receive it.

The same survey revealed that 70 percent of teens already rely on AI to complete homework assignments — a figure most parents likely suspected without needing a study to confirm it.

“We have been a little bit bogged down in really simplistic questions of ‘do you use it to cheat or not?'” Robb said.

That narrow framing, he argued, fails to capture other dangers, including teens interacting with nude deepfakes.

What Parents Should Do Now

Earlier guidance I have offered covers how to ensure AI supplements rather than replaces a child’s learning, how to teach privacy habits, and how to fact-check information pulled from chatbots. A separate conversation, however, is needed about staying safe when encountering AI-made content.

Steel suggested explaining to children that once sexualized images are posted online, anyone can save them to private archives or personal devices, making removal from the public sphere effectively impossible. He also recommended teaching younger kids and teens how to avoid becoming targets of deepfakes created by others: once an ordinary selfie is posted publicly, anyone with access can use AI to graft that person’s head onto a nude body.

Practical steps include instructing children to share photos only through private channels rather than public accounts, and to verify they can trust every friend or follower who sees those images. Steel framed limiting strangers’ access to kids’ photos, paired with clear education about deepfake harms, as the strongest available protection.

These conversations, he emphasized, should begin at younger ages — before the habits and assumptions that make teens comfortable “trying on” virtual clothes normalize the leap to creating fully undressed AI imagery.