🛡️ Child Safety Incident Notice
The content has been permanently removed and is no longer accessible. The account has been permanently banned from the platform. The matter has been reported as required by law.
🔍 What Happened?
A 15-year-old user uploaded sexual images of herself to our AI rating system. Our AI moderation — which is supposed to detect uploads involving apparent minors and block them automatically — misclassified her as an adult and approved the content.
The content remained live on the platform for approximately two weeks before it was discovered and removed. This coincided with a period of reduced staff monitoring during a team holiday.
Critically, the content was not reported by any user during this window. It received votes and ratings from other users instead — normal platform interactions that do not notify our safety team or trigger any review. It was only identified once staff returned and conducted a routine review.
This incident is a direct example of why this matters. Voting or rating content does nothing to flag it for our safety team — it just moves on like any other post. If you ever see content that you believe may involve a minor, or anything else that looks wrong, use the Report button. Do not rate it, comment on it, or vote on it. A report reaches a human. A vote does not. Our AI moderation does not always catch everything — as this incident proves — and real reports from real users are often the only way something like this gets caught quickly.
⚙️ What We Did About It
As soon as the content was identified, it was removed immediately and the account was permanently banned from the platform. In accordance with U.S. federal law (18 U.S.C. §2258A), which requires electronic service providers to report apparent child sexual abuse material to the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC), a report was filed through NCMEC's CyberTipline. We are cooperating with any follow-up from authorities as required.
We want to be direct about something: content of this nature is classified as child sexual abuse material (CSAM) under federal law regardless of who uploaded it, including self-uploads by a minor. We do not have discretion to treat it otherwise, and we are not able to allow the account — or any account belonging to a minor — to continue using the platform in any capacity.
In response to this incident, we have made the following changes:
- AI age-estimation review: We are auditing why our AI classified this user as an adult and are tightening the age-estimation thresholds used by the moderation system, including adding a wider safety margin around borderline cases.
- Manual review queue for borderline cases: Uploads where the AI's age confidence is not high will now be routed to a manual review queue rather than being auto-approved.
- Reduced-staffing monitoring procedures: We are updating our internal procedures to ensure AI-approved uploads receive additional review coverage during holidays and other periods of reduced staff availability.
- Reinforced reporting education: We are adding in-platform reminders that voting/rating is not a substitute for reporting, and that the Report button is the only action that reaches our safety team.
🧒 A Note on Child Safety — Read This If You Are Under 18
If you are under 18, you must not upload nude or sexual images of yourself to this platform, or to any platform, under any circumstances — including images of yourself that you took yourself. This is not a matter of site policy alone; content like this is classified as CSAM under federal law, and creating or distributing it can carry serious legal consequences, even when the person in the image is the one who uploaded it. An AI system approving or rating an upload does not make it permitted, and never will.
The minimum age to use RateMyBody.net at all is 18. This is a firm rule with zero exceptions. If we determine that an account belongs to a minor, that account will be permanently banned and, where content is involved, reported as required by law.
If you are a minor and need support, or if you're worried about images of yourself online, organizations like NCMEC's Take It Down can help you get content removed and offer guidance — confidentially and free of charge.
🙇 Apology
We sincerely apologise that this happened, and that our AI moderation failed to catch it. Content like this should never have been approved in the first place, and it should never have remained live for two weeks. That is on us, and we are treating it with the seriousness it deserves.
We also want to be honest with our community: our AI moderation does not always work. It is a tool, not a guarantee. We are actively improving it, but we need our users to keep reporting anything that looks wrong rather than assuming the AI already caught it.
📅 Timeline
- Upload occurred during a team holiday period with reduced staff monitoring. AI moderation misclassified the user as an adult and approved the content.
- ~2 weeks: Content remained live. It was voted/rated by users but not reported by anyone during this window.
- Staff return: Content identified during routine review and removed immediately.
- Following removal: Account permanently banned. Report filed with NCMEC's CyberTipline as required by law. AI age-estimation thresholds and moderation workflow under review.
- July 3, 2026 — This statement published.
Please, report — don't vote. We will continue improving our AI moderation, but we need your help catching what it misses. Thank you for your continued trust in this community.