Advocacy group questions Department of Education's decision to post images on X

The recent controversy surrounding X’s AI bot Grok’s willingness to ‘nudify’ and sexualise images of real people appears to have become a tipping point for some in Government File picture: Kirill Kudryavtsev/Getty

A prominent privacy-rights advocacy group has queried the Department of Education's use of social media site X and its decision to post images of children on the platform.

Digital Rights Ireland (DRI) has asked what precautions under GDPR the department has taken in terms of its posting to the Elon Musk-owned site in the wake of revelations X is offering a service to paid subscribers allowing the digital alteration of images shared to X.

A recent investigation by content analysis firm Copyleaks claimed that X users were, as of December 31, generating “roughly one nonconsensual sexualised image per minute”.

Professor of law at UCD and chairman of DRI, TJ McIntyre, wrote to the Department of Education in recent days querying what steps it had taken to mitigate its use of X as a publicly-funded body.

“I am writing on behalf of DRI regarding the department’s use of X, which I note includes the posting of images of children,” Prof McIntyre wrote.

As you will be aware from recent media coverage, X offers a paid service which permits and indeed encourages the creation of sexualised images from pictures of individuals which are posted to its site.

“In light of this, it appears to me that posting images of individuals to X constitutes a high risk to those individuals, and especially to children,” he said.

Prof McIntyre then queried whether or not a data protection impact assessment had been carried out in terms of its postings on X, and asked if the Department planned to delete previously-posted images from the platform or if it intends to continue using X going forward.

X had been, until recently, routinely used by Government Departments and Ministers to communicate with the public.

However, the recent controversy surrounding X’s AI bot Grok’s capacity to ‘nudify’ and sexualise images of real people appears to have become a tipping point for some in Government, with both media minister Patrick O’Donovan and his counterpart with responsibility for AI Niamh Smyth both deleting their accounts last week.

The Department of Education, which has previously been informed by its own hired consultants that a public body posting to X represented "brand safety concerns", did not respond to a request for comment regarding the DRI complaint. It has likewise yet to respond to the DRI query itself. The department posts on X most days. 

On Friday last it posted a message of congratulations for the winner of the Young Scientist competition Aoibheann Daly, along with two images of Ms Daly together with minister for education Hildegarde Naughton.

Last November it reposted a message from the Data Protection Commission (DPC) urging parents to “pause before you post” in the context of putting images of their own children online.

Meanwhile, it emerged on Monday that fines totalling more than €4bn owed to the DPC by various companies — including X — which have been sanctioned under GDPR have yet to be collected.

Over the past six years, the commission has levied an incredible €4.04bn in fines, mostly on multinational technology companies.

However, of that total, €4.02bn remains uncollected and just €20m has been paid in fines so far.