The Use of AI in the Race to Combat Human Trafficking

This post reviews some of the rising trends in AI use to enable human trafficking.

The rollout of Artificial Intelligence (AI) to mainstream technologies like customer service webpages, social media platforms, wireless devices, and in vehicles has embedded the newest innovative technology into the daily lives of Americans. Every day, American users learn of new ways to use the technology to ease their professional and personal lives. However, not all users are utilizing the technology for good.

AI’s growth into everyday technology has not only increased its use among traditional users, but also amongst bad actors like transnational criminal organizations (TCOs). The impact already been stark in cases of human trafficking through recruitment methods and illicit advertising. To inform stakeholders and raise awareness, this post will review some of the rising trends in AI use to enable human trafficking.

Emerging Trends in AI Use

Advancements in technologies has resulted in the incorporation of artificial technology through deepfake images and videos, voice calls, messaging, and live translation, as illustrated in the 2025 Trafficking in Persons Report published by the Department of State. Concerns over the dissemination of deepfakes have been voiced by celebrities and other well-known individuals such as First Lady Melania Trump. The First Lady has even made the issue one of her leading causes since returning to the White House, and championed the recent passage of the Take It Down Act.

These methods have enabled traffickers to develop advanced schemes in the recruitment of individuals by misusing the technology’s capabilities to create authentic sounding messages in the native languages of their potential victims – even leveraging the tool to create sympathetic messages to appeal to individuals facing life challenges to build trust.

The rise in child sexual abuse materials (CSAM) generated by deepfake images and videos has sadly facilitated bad actors to meet the demands of the child sex market. The State Department recognizes CSAM and sextortion as a gateway to child sex trafficking. To highlight the relative ease for individuals to create this content, here is a link to a case in Springfield, Missouri. Outlined in this real-life example, a man was discovered receiving child pornography materials and creating obscene images that depicted female celebrities as minors being subjected to sexual abuse through AI. Upon review of the laptop, investigators also found other AI generated CSAM content. The initial call to law enforcement placed the man in a coffee shop reviewing and creating these materials.

Not only does this case exemplify the relative ease it takes for someone to create sexual images of minors and others, but the public setting of the crime is also not uncommon with the rise of AI. The technology is embedded within social media platforms and has allowed individuals to harvest profiles of children and other individuals to generate the content and post it on public platforms without consent. The legal framework to protect data privacy and hold developers of AI and social media platforms accountable to the misuse of their applications has been reactionary to rising cases. The American Bar Association published an article earlier this year that describes the complexities lawmakers and prosecutors must address when prosecuting cases of AI-generated images without existing frameworks. Recently passed federal laws like the 2025 Take It Down Act, which criminalizes the sharing of non-consensual intimate images and requires platforms to remove these images, have begun to answer some of these issues but remain unclear in their effectiveness so far.

The internet today is not the same internet that was first introduced in the last century, and AI will continue to evolve; to combat bad actors in this space, any effort to curb its negative use must evolve with it. As users continue to unlock new applications of AI, actors in the anti-human trafficking space have incorporated its usage in prevention and tracking measures.

Read more about the ethical use of AI and other technologies in prevention initiatives on our previous post that provide real-world application of technologies to prevent human trafficking.