BERKS COUNTY, Pa.- Authorities are continuing to investigate more troubling issues associated with the misuse of AI in schools.
“What we’re seeing is AI is the thing now,” said Meg McCallum with the Berks County District Attorney’s office. She says the misuse of AI, turning it into criminal activity, is a growing problem with young people.
“Our youthful population, their brains aren’t formed, and they think what they’re doing is funny and they’re not always thinking about what the consequences are,” McCallum said.
She says many kids use AI for legitimate, school-related purposes. But more and more, authorities say they’re seeing misuse.
“There were students at Exeter that this happened to, I want to say in the fall, that we prosecuted,” explained McCallum. “In that particular case what they did was, [they] were going on the females’ social medias, their Instagrams. They were friends with them and they were taking their pictures and then using the heads on, there are websites out there with these naked bodies and things like that, and then they were putting them up on social media and sharing them.”
The Brandywine Heights Area superintendent sent a letter to the community Thursday addressing similar AI-related issues that were happening in the high school.
Investigators say the crimes and misuse associated with AI are happening in schools all around the county and that it’s not just specific to one.
“I think they just don’t recognize one, the severe consequences to other people, and two, that what they’re doing is a crime,” added McCallum.
She says the law changed to help prosecute cases involving harmful AI images just before the start of 2025 and it’s a problem law enforcement takes very seriously.