Gráinne Seoige has opened up about becoming a victim of deepfake sexual images.
In 2024, Gráinne ran as Fianna Fáil’s candidate for the Galway West constituency. During this time, she her image was used to create deepfake content without her consent or knowledge.
The sexual image went viral online and was shared widely, before Gráinne went to the Gardaí.
Speaking on Prime Time this week, she discussed the rise in “nudification” apps.
“It was the most shocking thing that’s ever happened to me in my life and it took me a long time to really process it,” she explained.
“This happened in the middle of the election campaign, so not only was it sexual image abuse, it was election interference and it happened at a time when I was in the middle of meeting many people on a daily basis in the middle of canvassing.
“I don’t know to what extent this sexual image abuse affected my campaign, but it certainly had an effect. Broadening it out from myself, if any woman asked me, ‘Should I stand for office?’, I’d be very reluctant to say, ‘Go for it’, because of the world we’re living in right now,” she continued.
“People who dismiss these things as ‘a bit of a craic’ and something not to be taken too seriously, are the people whose bodies will never be used as commodities and the people whose bodies will never be abused and violated in this way, and therefore, they never have to understand it.”
She went on to say that when she went to the Gardaí, they would not share where they had originally seen the photo. Gráinne admitted that she felt that “protecting the lads on the WhatsApp group was far more important than my dignity or my right to defend myself against a crime”.
“Shame and keeping women silent and keeping people like me who have been victims silent, and protecting the perpetrators is what is happening right now. We need to open this conversation up. I have written to a lot of people in the last number of days to get them involved in the conversation,” she continued.
“The harm is real, the harm is long-lasting, and we need to get a grip on this right now.”
She confessed that she now worries for the children in her life, as X and its AI-bot Grok have come under fire recently for the ability for users to request the bot to “undress” anyone who posts images on the app, including children.
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“I’m the godmother to a very beautiful and innocent four-year-old. I couldn’t imagine something like that to happen to her, but it is a possibility because you don’t have to be a technical whizz kid to create this image now. All you have to do is pay for Grok AI.”
She went on to say: “It takes seconds, and they can go around the world at scale and reach thousands of people almost in the blink of an eye. This cannot be allowed to stand. If staying silent was an option, I would do it because I’m already getting pushback on social media saying I’m looking for attention, I’m only doing this to bring myself back into the public eye.
“I’ve had to deal with the shame and humiliation of this for almost a year and a half. It has been deeply traumatising, and so my heart goes out to any woman and any family who is dealing with this right now.
“I want to use [my voice] and do some good, because some good has to come out of the traumatic experience that I went through,” Gráinne concluded.
