Some teens at Lake Zurich High School and President Donald Trump have something in common: The use of artificial intelligence to manufacture deepfakes on social media.
While the president’s use of AI to turn himself into Jesus Christ or a friend of His, it is the Lake Zurich students who took image morphing to another level. They distributed photos of female classmates’ heads on the naked bodies of adult women plucked from online sources.
Another instance where high-tech mixed with social media has taken us down a dark path. The teens’ porn “prank” also continues cyberbullying females online.
Law enforcement authorities and officials in Lake Zurich Unit School District 95 have been tight-lipped over the situation at the high school, home of the Bears. Some may remember the school had been known as Ela-Vernon High School until residents of Vernon Township split and formed Adlai Stevenson High School, which opened in the fall of 1965.
Once more famous for being the alma mater of Chicago Bears linebacker Jack Sanborn, the high school now joins a growing lineup of nearly 100 schools across the nation that have seen a spike in the use of AI-generated fake nudes aimed at classmates.
District officials say the case, the specifics of which they turned over to Lake Zurich police back in February, involves juveniles allegedly distributing the lewd photos online. As juveniles, the names of those involved will not be disclosed.
Certainly, classmates know the perpetrators, as do some parents who have stormed at least one school board session seeking answers. One parent at a recent school board meeting urged that the boys be moved to another school at least for the time being.
Allowing them to remain at Lake Zurich High “sends the wrong signal to the girls,” she said, according to a front-page account by Joseph States in the News-Sun of April 11. Lake Zurich police say they are in the midst of a criminal investigation.
If I were the kids’ parents, I’d start lawyering up. If they haven’t already.
Because the “prank” isn’t going away. I was told an estimated 40 girls were victims of this local nude-image caper that parents claim harassed, intimidated and embarrassed young teens at the school. The school has not said how many girls at the school were victims, although another estimate by one mother is 33.
Reportedly, the students who distributed the pictures only faced an in-school suspension, whatever that entails. Some parents of the girls don’t think the victims have been protected enough.
There is a federal law, the Take it Down Act, signed by President Trump last year, making it a crime to publish nonconsensual deep-fake nudes, intimate images, revenge porn and sextortion. First lady Melania Trump championed the bill as part of her “Be Best” campaign against cyberbullying.
Illinois also has anti-cyberbullying laws and is among 46 states that have laws addressing the growing and embarrassing problem of deepfakes, spread usually by teen boys. Like the two who admitted last month in a Pennsylvania court, that they made 59 similar images of classmates at a school in Lancaster County, west of Philadelphia.
They were placed on probation, given 60 hours of community service and ordered to pay restitution to the victims. The county judge in the case noted that if they were adults, they would have been sentenced to prison.
One way to stop this proliferation of deep-fake nudity is to prosecute the offenders and make examples that such foolery has consequences. Also, the school board should boot the culprits out of Lake Zurich High.
The AI case may remind some of what Illinois lawmaker Nick Sauer of the Barrington area found out back in 2023. Once a rising star in the Republican Party, he pleaded guilty to non-consensual dissemination of a private sexual image and was sentenced to 90 days in jail, two years’ probation and 120 hours of public service.
That was after an ex-girlfriend accused him in 2018 of using nude photos she had sent to him privately. For two years, he allegedly shared the images with other men.
The Lake Zurich teens probably thought what they were doing was good for hearty laughs. Instead, they continued the victimization of women by disseminating deep-fake images.
Such has been happening to female celebrities since young people have become technologically adept at using artificial intelligence. There’s only one way to end this intrusion into young girls’ personal lives and the negative impact it can have on them.
Prosecute the violators to the full extent of the law. Anything less sends a message that such “pranks” will be tolerated.
Charles Selle is a former News-Sun reporter, political editor and editor. sellenews@gmail.com. X @sellenews.
