Jenna Ortega said she closed her X (then Twitter) account after receiving an “influx” of explicit images on the platform.
Ortega, 21, made the comments during a recent conversation on The New York Times’ “The Interview” podcast.
During the chat, she revealed her feelings about AI, saying that she had previously been sent AI-generated images of herself as X’s child.
“I hate AI,” Ortega said when asked to share his thoughts on the emerging technology that can be used to create lifelike images and videos, including fake pornography.
“Did I like being 14 and making a Twitter account because I had to, and seeing dirty edited content about me as a kid? No. It’s appalling. It’s corrupt. It’s wrong,” she said.
The former child actor, who became famous for her roles in the Disney Channel series “Stuck in the Middle” and the CW comedy “Jane the Virgin,” said she was told to sign up for Twitter to build her image.
Jenna Ortega rose to fame as a child star on Disney Channel’s “Stuck in the Middle.” Eric McCandless/Disney Channel via Getty Images
“One of the first – actually the first DM I opened on my own when I was 12 was an unsolicited picture of a man’s genitalia and that was just the beginning of what was to come,” she added.
Ortega said she eventually deleted the app “about two, three years ago” because of the “flood” 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 this.
Ortega isn’t the first person to target those who create and distribute realistic AI porn.
Earlier this year, Taylor Swift’s image was used in a series of sexually explicit posts that went viral on X.
In the end, X temporarily blocked the search for the singer as a safety measure.
In a statement at the time, the company said: “Posting images of non-consensual nudity (NCN) is strictly prohibited on X and we have a zero-tolerance policy for such content.”
“Our teams are actively removing all identified images and taking appropriate action against the accounts responsible for posting them,” it added.
The incident led to calls for new legislation to combat the threat posed by deepfakes.
In 2023, Democratic Representative Joseph Morrell proposed a bill that would make it a crime to knowingly share or threaten to share digitally altered images of a person engaging in overt sexual behavior.
The bill, titled the Intimate Image Profound Forgery Prevention Act, has been referred to the House Judiciary Committee, but no further action has yet been taken.
“We’ve seen the devastating effects intimate deep fake images have had on everyone from young schoolgirls to global celebrities,” Morrell said on the subject. “We have a responsibility to take decisive action to end these heinous crimes.