Wired finds 400+ AI apps hiding sexual deepfake tools: schools and parents cannot rely on app store checks

On 2 November 2026 Wired published an investigation into a network of more than 400 apps and websites that looked like everyday AI tools but contained hidden sexual deepfake features. According to reports of the investigation by 9to5Mac and IBTimes Australia, Apple removed 19 apps after Wired contacted it, and Meta said it took action against 11,600 ad accounts and 15,000 pages linked to the network. Wired found thousands of video ads for the apps on Facebook and Instagram. IBTimes reports that 27 of the apps were live on Google Play in September with more than 350,000 combined downloads, and that Google had already removed most of them before Wired made contact.

The apps were identified by Wired working with AI Forensics, a European nonprofit whose researcher Paul Bouchaud reverse-engineered them. Apple said: "We review every app before it's published, and these apps complied with our rules when we reviewed them." A Meta spokesperson said: "We have strict rules against promoting nudify apps." Researchers say women and girls are most often targeted by this kind of tool.

Why it matters beyond the headline: the apps did not announce what they could do. A person, or a pupil, who downloaded one saw an ordinary-looking AI app in an official store, promoted by adverts in feeds they already use. The usual advice, to download only from official stores, was not enough here. Anyone who can take a photograph of a classmate, a colleague or a neighbour can be a victim of this kind of tool, and anyone with a phone can be handed one.

Dan Fitzpatrick, The AI Educator, says the lesson is not that AI apps should be banned from schools or homes. It is that the store listing and the icon tell you nothing about what a tool does, so the habit that protects people is asking what it does with a photograph. Teachers are already ahead of policy on this: safeguarding leads are dealing with manipulated images before national guidance has caught up. Trust is the second issue. A child or colleague who finds a fake image of themselves needs an adult who responds with support, not blame. Equity is the third. Schools with trained staff and briefed parents will cope; others will not.

For school leaders, the steps for this term are concrete. Check that the safeguarding policy names AI-generated and manipulated sexual imagery and says what staff do in the first hour after a report. Make sure every adult in the building knows that Report Remove, the Childline and Internet Watch Foundation service, lets under-18s report sexual images of themselves. Tell parents in plain language that an app's store listing and its adverts do not show what it can do. Teach pupils how image tools work and why creating or sharing a fake harms a real person. For employers, put the same question to any AI tool staff use, and name one person who answers for the answer.

Fitzpatrick works with schools, colleges, governing bodies and government organisations on adopting AI and building AI literacy with wellbeing at the centre, and writes regularly on what AI means for learning and work.

Dan Fitzpatrick is available for interview and comment on this story. He is available today for live or pre-recorded radio, TV, podcast and print interviews, with a broadcast-quality remote setup for live or pre-recorded down-the-line interviews. Contact: dan@theaieducator.io