Sep 21, 2026Unverified
Stanford University Acknowledged Using AI to Alter Student Photo for Campus Banners, Replacing Hispanic Student With Black Woman
AI loose in the worldBias and discriminationDERIVED
Approved by person, Oct 11, 2026. How entries are approved
Stanford University acknowledged using AI to alter a 2024 student photograph for campus banners in September 2026. The altered image replaced Hispanic student Billy Ramirez with a Black woman and made two other students appear thinner. Ramirez said being "erased" was upsetting and frustrating. Stanford said the alteration and lack of disclosure violated its AI policy and later said it was removing the banners.
What this means for youAt home, this shows AI can quietly change photos of real people, so images may not be what they seem. At work, organizations using AI for images need disclosure rules and human review. In government, agencies publishing AI-edited images need clear labeling and accountability when errors affect people's identities.
Sources
- AI Incident Databasehttps://incidentdatabase.ai/cite/1708
Data from the AI Incident Database (incidentdatabase.ai), licensed CC BY-SA 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/). McGregor, S. (2021) Preventing Repeated Real World AI Failures by Cataloging Incidents: The AI Incident Database. IAAI-21.
Source data license: CC BY-SA 4.0 (database). Report contents keep their own rights; reports.text, submissions, images and videos are excluded from the data license.
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