AI Risk Wire

Cases › produced harmful content › LR-2026-0573

AI-generated deepfake investigation involving more than 50 women (Ottawa Police, Canada)

Preliminary Why: Publisher not yet named · subject to change

Developing: a major or severe case captured in the last 72 hours. Later changes are logged on the corrections page.

Status: no action reported

Severity major
Reported 4 Jun 2026

No source states: loss or records, developer and model, agent tool, could do, deployer, industry.

Severity major: Test applied: many third parties, meaning a stated count of two or more affected parties. Fact: Ottawa Police now say they believe more than 50 women are affected.

The case concerns AI-generated nude deepfakes made from photos of Canadian women taken from social media, and Ottawa police now believe more than 50 women are affected. Police first became aware of the case on Sept. 6, 2025, after a woman reported being depicted in harmful content on a Tumblr account and another website. Investigators then followed IP addresses, records from X, Bell Canada and Airbnb, and a search warrant to identify the accused, Stephen Lowe, who was arrested on Feb. 12, 2026 and faces 79 charges. A second man, Gregry Peter Joseph Van Beek, was arrested on May 2 and faces seven charges. None of the allegations has been proven in court.

What happened

1 · What it was doingThe case involves AI-generated nude deepfakes of real Canadian women, according to the Ottawa Police Service.
2 · What went wrongWomen say their social media photos were taken and manipulated into violent imagery.
3 · What it reached or didPolice now believe more than 50 women are affected, while up to 25 are identified in court documents.

What was done

No source states an action or fix.

Risks

Manipulation and misinformation
Primary65 incidents
Harmful content and jailbreaks
Also84 incidents
Rising: 6 vs 3.8 a week

Sorted by rule from the case's fields; not yet read from the sources.

Controls

Not yet read for controls. Controls that mitigate the primary risk:

Model

Marking machine-made output · Abuse monitoring and account enforcement · Content safety classifiers

Application

People told they are dealing with AI

Infrastructure / target

Phishing and fraud filters

Similar incidents

Ottawa police charge men over AI deepfakes of dozens of Canadian women2026-05-29

All cases of this kind ›

Evidence

No source states: how it was caught, when it happened, how many records were exposed, the direct loss, a count of the other parties affected, any court case, the cause, what set it off, what was done.

Show the full account: 9 items from the primary sources

What happened, in order

  1. Aug. 1, 2020 Investigator believed an unknown person created a Tumblr account and posted images.
  2. Sept. 6, 2025 Ottawa police became aware of the case after a woman reported harmful content.
  3. Oct. 3, 2025 X provided the IP address connected to the identified account.
  4. Dec. 26, 2025 Property owner identified Stephen Lowe as a past guest who stayed in February 2024.
  5. Dec. 29, 2025 Airbnb confirmed Lowe had stayed at the Ottawa address.
  6. Jan. 28, 2026 A search warrant was obtained.
  7. Feb. 12, 2026 RCMP executed the warrant, arrested Lowe and seized 22 electronic devices.
  8. March 12, 2026 Website provided IP addresses linked to a user, which Bell Canada tied to Van Beek.
  9. May 19 Police were still trying to identify a third man connected to the case.
Show every field, with its source and grade

What happened

Earliest source we hold
2026-06-04
D inferred by us from the described behaviour, reason shown
Who caught it
the victim
C one secondary source states it
When it was found
2025-09-06
C one secondary source states it
What went wrong
produced harmful content
D inferred by us from the described behaviour, reason shown

Impact

Severity
major
D inferred by us from the described behaviour, reason shown
Who was affected
more than 50 women
C one secondary source states it
Why this severity
Test applied: many third parties, meaning a stated count of two or more affected parties. Fact: Ottawa Police now say they believe more than 50 women are affected.
D inferred by us from the described behaviour, reason shown

Context

Country
Canada
C one secondary source states it

Notes on gaps

No remediation was reported. The victim count is stated as more than 50, so no integer count was written. The Airbnb date error (2025 instead of 2024) is noted in the sources but not otherwise used. Story steps are drawn from the press reporting, not from any party's own account.

LR-2026-0573 · version 1 · published 2026-11-01 after automatic checks; not yet checked field by field by a person · JSON