Jenna Ortega has opened up about the "terrifying" reason that she ended up deleting her X account.
The Miller's Girl star got candid about what it was like growing up as a child in the spotlight, especially in a world where technology was advancing so quickly while speaking about her global levels of fame during a recent interview on a podcast for the New York Times.
Ortega made her on-screen debut in 2012 at just nine years old but was propelled to new heights of fame over the past few years with appearances in the Scream franchise, as well as the leading role in Netflix's hit series Wednesday.
Recently, she's also joined a star-studded line-up for Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, which is set to be released early next month.
But being exposed to a wide range of audiences came with a handful of horrifying challenges.
"I hate AI. I mean, here’s the thing: AI could be used for incredible things. I think I saw something the other day where they were saying that artificial intelligence was able to detect breast cancer four years before it progressed. That’s beautiful. Let’s keep it to that," she said.
However, the 21-year-old has also experienced the negative sides of AI personally.
"Did I like being 14 and making a Twitter account because I was supposed to and seeing dirty edited content of me as a child? No. It’s terrifying. It’s corrupt. It’s wrong," she added.
This type of explicit content was not new to Ortega though.
"The first [direct message] I ever opened myself when I was 12 was an unsolicited photo of a man’s genitals. And that was just the beginning of what was to come."
The actress revealed that she was told to create an X account (formerly Twitter) as it would help "build your image", but found it became a dark place once her fame skyrocketed.
"I ended up deleting it about two, three years ago because the influx after the show [Wednesday] had come out — these absurd images and photos, and I already was in a confused state that I just deleted it," she explained.
Opening up about the "disgusting" AI images she was sent of herself, Ortega added: "It made me feel bad. It made me feel uncomfortable. Anyway, that’s why I deleted it, because I couldn’t say anything without seeing something like that.
"So one day I just woke up, and I thought, ‘Oh, I don’t need this anymore,’ so I dropped it," she added.
Ortega isn't the only child star to experience the horrors of X-rated AI images.
Kaylin Hayman, best known for her role in Just Roll With It on Disney Channel TV, was shocked when she received a call from the FBI notifying her of a harrowing incident taking place thousands of miles away from her.
A man was using artificial intelligence to conjure up indecent images of the 16-year-old as well as other children, using their faces on images of adults performing sexual acts.
"I broke down in tears when I heard," she said to Sky News in an interview earlier this year. "It feels like such an invasion of my privacy. It doesn't feel real that someone I don't know could see me in such a manner."
She continued: "My innocence was just stripped away from me in that moment. In those images, I was a 12-year-old girl and so it was heartbreaking, to say the least. I felt so lonely because I didn't know this was actually a crime that was going on in the world."
AI-related sexual crimes, especially against children, have been on the rise and as technology gets more advanced, investigators around the world are having a more difficult time figuring out which images have been forged from which ones contain real victims.
If you or someone you know has been sexually harassed using AI call or text the Childhelp abuse hotline at 800-422-4453 or visit their website for more resources and to report child abuse.
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