The President of the PL SA intervenes with the Prosecutor General
The President of the Personal Data Protection Office intervenes with the Prosecutor General regarding the generation of a nude photo of a student.
Mirosław Wróblewski, President of the Personal Data Protection Office, asked Waldemar Żurek, the Prosecutor General, to consider reopening an investigation into the case of students at one of the schools altering a photo of their classmate using an application that utilises artificial intelligence. The generated nude photo of the student was then published on social media.
In connection with this incident, at the beginning of June 2025, the President of the Personal Data Protection Office notified the police of a possible crime. We provided details of the notification in a statement on our website. However, the police refused to initiate proceedings in this case pursuant to a decision of June 12, 2025, which was approved on June 23, 2025, by the prosecutor's office.
Law enforcement authorities refused to initiate an investigation, as they considered that the act did not constitute a criminal offense under Article 190a § 2 of the Criminal Code, Article 202 § 3 of the Criminal Code, and Article 107(1) of the Act of 10 May 2018 on the Protection of Personal Data They also justified their decision by stating that the victimised student did not suffer any financial or personal damage. The police and the prosecutor's office also concluded that “the photograph does not contain pornographic content, as it does not depict the child's genitals, nor does it depict the child participating in actual or simulated sexual activity.” Law enforcement authorities also stated that the photograph of the minor was not obtained from a protected personal data file, but from materials freely available on the internet. They also concluded that altering the photograph did not constitute the processing of personal data.
The President of the Personal Data Protection Office disagrees with this argument. He emphasizes that from the point of view of personal data protection regulations, it is irrelevant that the photograph of the minor was obtained from publicly available materials. The only thing that matters is that it is information about an identified or identifiable person. The President of the Personal Data Protection Office also refutes the argument that editing a photo of a minor does not constitute the processing of personal data.
The modification of a minor's image constitutes the processing of personal data, and the image undoubtedly belongs to this data, and the perpetrators were not entitled to use the minor's image in any way, let alone modify it and share it further, thereby violating the minor's personal rights in the form of her dignity and right to privacy, reads Mirosław Wróblewski's letter to Waldemar Żurek.
The President of the Personal Data Protection Office believes that law enforcement authorities did not examine the substantive issues raised in this case, because if they had, a different procedural decision would have been made.
The President of the Personal Data Protection Office is convincing the Prosecutor General that it is necessary to initiate criminal proceedings in this case, not only because of the nature of the act, but also because of the age of the victim and the degree of harmfulness of the perpetrators' behavior. The proceedings should indicate and make it clear that such behavior is not socially acceptable and will not go unpunished.
In his letter to Waldemar Żurek, Mirosław Wróblewski also presents an analysis of image processing as personal data. He also draws attention to the phenomenon of CSAM, or “child sexual abuse material,” which refers to materials depicting the sexual abuse of children. He outlines the negative consequences of this phenomenon and points out that crimes of this nature are very serious and are already treated as such by the courts.
The full text of the letter to the Prosecutor General and an analysis of the entire issue can be found in the file attached below (in Polish).