Meta Ran Ads for an App That Promised to Nudify Female Politicians
Meta ran adverts on Facebook and Instagram promoting an AI "nudify" app called Kromix, which used the likeness of a prominent female US politician to advertise its ability to generate nonconsensual pornographic deepfakes, despite the company's own policies banning sexual content in adverts. The episode highlights Meta's repeated failure to stop advertisers exploiting its platforms to promote tools that create nonconsensual intimate imagery, and raises concerns about how such technology is increasingly being used to target elected officials, who are overwhelmingly women.
Kromix marketed itself as an "AI image styler" with "no restrictions," inviting paid users to upload photos for use in explicit scenarios, and was also available via Apple's App Store until Wired contacted the company. The ads, targeted solely at male users, were traced to an account that ran 32 adverts over five to 46 hours before Meta removed them following Wired's enquiry; the account had been created on 3 August. The Tech Transparency Project, which uncovered the ads, and researchers at the American Sunlight Project warned that easily accessible AI tools are turning ordinary public images of politicians into material for deepfake abuse, echoing similar cases involving Grok-generated images of officials in Sweden, England and Northern Ireland earlier this year.
- Meta ran ads for an AI app that deepfaked a female politician into porn
- Kromix let users create "nudify" content breaching Meta and Apple policies
- Ads were pulled only after Wired questioned Meta about them
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AI “nudify” apps use images of real people to create fake sexual pictures, often without their consent. Kromix advertised a paid service that invited users to upload photos and place people in explicit scenes. Meta owns Facebook and Instagram, where businesses can pay to show adverts to selected audiences.
The issue sits within wider concerns about deepfake abuse and how easily such tools can be accessed. Researchers say public images of politicians, many of whom are women, can be used to target them with fabricated sexual material. The case also raises questions about how platforms enforce rules against sexual content in adverts.
Both sides, in good faith
The strongest fair case each way — we don't pick a winner.
The case for
Meta operates across billions of daily pieces of content, and whilst the company has clear policies against sexual content, advertisers deliberately obscure their intentions—marketing deepfake tools as 'AI image stylizers with no restrictions.' The ad account operated for only five to 46 hours before removal, demonstrating that Meta's systems eventually catch violations. This appears to reflect the inevitable imperfection of moderation at massive scale rather than negligent failure, and the problem of misused technology platforms affects the entire digital ecosystem, not uniquely Meta.
The case against
Meta's repeated failure to prevent advertisers from promoting nonconsensual intimate imagery tools represents a serious breach of responsibility given the company's explicit policies, vast resources, and the severe nature of the harm. The pattern of such incidents—not a one-off but part of an ongoing problem—suggests enforcement remains inadequate despite Meta's capability to do better. Female politicians disproportionately bear this burden of abuse, and Meta's failures enable systematic gender-based harassment of public figures.
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