The University added language that addresses artificial-intelligence-generated sexual content, expands the definition of fondling and ensures more robust consequences for violations of resolution agreements to its sexual misconduct policy on Monday.
The changes only apply to cases processed in the 2026-2027 academic year, a University Title IX official said.
Suggestions gathered from its institutions, including feedback from students, faculty and staff input from UT System’s review of its model policy during the 2025-26 academic year, was used to improve it, a University Title IX official said. State law requires the University to conduct a biennial review of their sexual misconduct policy.
The new definition of sexual exploitation in the UT System policy includes AI-generated and deepfake sexual images. Benjamin Wright, interim executive director of media relations for the UT System Office of External Affairs, wrote in an email the revision addresses “a broader scope of misconduct to capture the rise of ‘AI’ and ‘deep-fake’ generated images.”
Although the formal changes in the policy are in place this year, UT Austin previously addressed AI-generated sexual images by using its sexual exploitation provision, a University Title IX official said.
The new policy also codifies punishments for failure to comply with dispute resolution agreements which the official said was driven from student input. Students were more reluctant to use the adjudication process because “there is no way to hold somebody accountable to what gets agreed upon,” the official said.
“One of the things that is most common that students are seeking through the (alternative dispute resolution) process is for the two parties to agree that (they are) not going to contact each other anymore,” the official said. “So now, if you receive contact from that individual, they are no longer in compliance with the agreement.”
The definition of fondling changed due to a 2025 update to the FBI’s crime definitions. The revision makes clear that fondling involves touching private body parts while a person is “clothed or unclothed.”
Complaints are investigated differently between UT Austin and UT System policy. The University has a specific Title IX office and Department of Investigation and Adjudication that address complaints within the University Risk and Compliance Services.
The University is not planning to do a major rollout of the policy changes because “our process to address these complaints hasn’t really changed,” the University official said.
Sexual misconduct information is provided to students in an orientation module for incoming first-year and transfer students to familiarize themselves with the policy. A link to the updated policy can be found here.