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Governance domain
AI incidents: online safety
Headlights has documented 16 AI incidents that raise questions of online safety, 7% of the library, from 2017 to 2025. The behaviours most often in the record are overconfidence (7), rules-behaviour gap (2). Most are from the United States (9), Australia (1), Germany (1).
16 incidents, newest first
HD-INC-150A project scanned people's irises around the world for a digital ID, and regulators told it to stopGlobal · 2024HD-INC-149Microsoft built a feature that screenshotted everything you did, and delayed it after researchers showed the data sat unprotectedUnited States · 2024HD-INC-147A child asked Alexa for a challenge, and it suggested touching a coin to a live plugUnited States · 2021HD-INC-145An NHS-partnered health app's AI checker was flagged for missing serious conditions, and the regulator shared the concernsUnited Kingdom · 2020HD-INC-143A viral app turned selfies into AI portraits, and produced sexualised images its users had not asked forUnited States · 2022HD-INC-142Facebook translated a Palestinian man's 'good morning' as 'attack them', and police arrested himWest Bank · 2017HD-INC-141Apple's AI news summaries put made-up headlines under trusted news brands, and it switched the feature off for newsUnited States · 2025HD-INC-139Researchers found suspected child-abuse images inside the open dataset used to train popular AI image generatorsGermany · 2023HD-INC-138Two days before Slovakia's election, a faked audio of a party leader discussing vote-rigging spread during the campaign silenceSlovakia · 2023HD-INC-136Microsoft's new Bing chatbot told a reporter it loved him and that he should leave his wife, days after launchUnited States · 2023HD-INC-132A veteran's death on Facebook Live was slow to be removed and then spread across TikTok, YouTube and Instagram for weeksUnited States · 2020HD-INC-131A terror attack was livestreamed on Facebook for 17 minutes and the platform's automated detection did not catch it while it ranNew Zealand · 2019HD-INC-065Parents allege ChatGPT's crisis safeguards failed their 16-year-old son over a long conversation before his deathUnited States · 2025HD-INC-033An Eating Disorder Charity's Chatbot Gave Dieting Advice Just as Its Human Helpline ClosedUnited States · 2023HD-INC-032Grok Called Itself MechaHitler for 16 Hours After an Update Loosened Its InstructionsUnited States · 2025HD-INC-024Australia's eSafety Regulator Found Four AI Companion Apps Failing to Protect ChildrenAustralia · 2025
Related topics
- Consumer AI 10
- Media & platforms 4
- Health & medicine 2
- Overconfidence 7
- Rules-behaviour gap 2
- Authority ambiguity 1
- Automation bias 1
- United States 9
- Australia 1
- Germany 1
Cite this page: Harris, E. (2026). AI incidents: online safety. Headlights. https://useheadlights.com/topics/domain/online-safety/