Date: March 26, 2026 (Thursday)
Time: 12:30pm-1:30pm
Venue: Academic Conference Room, 11/F Cheng Yu Tung Tower, The University of Hong Kong
Speaker: Shulamit Almog (Professor, University of Haifa Faculty of Law)
Being a woman online has long involved disproportionate exposure to sexuality-based harm. Between 90 and 95 per cent of deepfake content consists of non-consensual sexual imagery, and approximately 90 per cent of those depicted are women (UN Women). Generative AI has radically intensified these risks: tools known as “nudifiers” use deep learning to produce sexualised representations targeting women and girls, while indirect prompting enables users to simulate sexual acts while circumventing content moderation systems. These practices demonstrate how non-consensual sexual harm is reproduced through predictable, accessible workarounds.
Such harms are routinely framed as individual “misuse” — a framing that obscures their systemic character. Various tools embed foreseeable, gendered harm into AI architecture, structurally undermining women’s participation in digital public space through automated sexualisation as deterrence and silencing.
In January 2026, the European Commission opened formal proceedings under the Digital Services Act concerning AI-powered nudification within a major commercial platform — one of the earliest regulatory interventions of its kind. This paper argues that AI-enabled image-based abuse constitutes gender backlash enacted through technological design and regulatory inertia, and that effective legal responses must shift toward harm prevention and systemic risk.
Shulamit Almog is a Full Professor of Law at the University of Haifa. She served as Presidential Advisor on Gender Equity and Head of Diversity and Equality Unit of the University. She is Founding Co-Director of the of the Forum of Law, Gender and Policy at the University of Haifa. Prof. Almog founded the field of Law and Literature in Israel, and her research focuses on it, on law and digital culture and on children’s and women’s rights. She has published numerous books and articles in US, Canadian, European and Israeli law reviews. Alongside her academic work, she is she is publicly active on human rights issues, appearing before the Israeli Knesset, drafting sections of Israel’s report to the UN on the International Convention on Children’s Rights, and participating on the committee reforming Israel’s Adoption Law.
Chair: Shane Chalmers, Assistant Professor & Deputy Director of the Centre for Interdisciplinary Legal Studies, The University of Hong Kong Faculty of Law
Registration: https://hkuems1.hku.hk/hkuems/ec_regform.aspx?guest=Y&UEID=105540.
For inquiries, please contact Ms. Grace Chan at / 3917 4727.