“Pornography addiction, especially in adolescents, has direct and negative adverse effects.” That is the conclusion of a recently published meta-analysis in the Journal of Psychiatry, Psychology, and Behavioral Research.

The research was based on a review of seven studies with subjects aged 14 to 25. The research found negative results from pornography addiction on society as well as the individual. In adolescents and young adults, an addiction to pornography can result in:

• depression
• aggressiveness
• antagonistic communication
• decreased empathetic tendencies
• poor inhibitory control
• lower working memory
• anxiety disorders

Now, on top of all the other problems tech companies are creating for teenagers, the top back-to-school apps this year are so-called “nudify apps” that use artificial intelligence (AI) to digitally remove people’s clothing while also altering their appearance.

The innocent school photo has now become a tool for generating pornography addiction and increasing dependence on smartphones, tablets, and other screens. In a book that is not even out yet (the publication date is 2027), researchers in India describe the impact of internet pornography addiction (IPA) on the adolescent brain:

Neuroimaging has shown reward circuits and frontal-striatal dysregulation, placing IPA in addiction neurobiology.

Excessive pornography use results in “self-stigmatization,” the authors note, resulting in social isolation. The impacts, however, can be even more disruptive when law enforcement is involved. 

“Many laws criminalize child sexual abuse material,” the authors note. The creation or distribution of a sexualized image of a minor could result in lifelong legal problems for porn-addicted adolescents. In the U.S., it can be a felony that includes jail time.

How big of a problem is adolescent pornography addiction? One out of every eight American teenagers has seen AI porn that featured either themselves or someone they know. That’s over 5 million sexualized images of minors floating around the internet somewhere. Try scrubbing all those out of the system.

Someone is trying. In July, San Francisco City Attorney David Chiu sent a cease-and-desist letter to tech giants demanding that they stop allowing access to 13 apps that allow images to be sexualized. In June, Chiu shut down 10 websites that allowed users to make nonconsensual sexualized images of so-called “deepfake pornography.”

In a recent investigation, CBS News tested 70 photo-editing apps with identical images of a fully clothed man and a fully clothed woman, and found that 19 of them generated “disturbing images and videos, which included nudity and explicit sexual content.”

Upon notification, Google Play and the Apple App Store have removed the apps that allow for nonconsensual sexualization. Meta also removed Facebook and Instagram ads advertising the offending apps.

It is intolerable that high-tech companies are allowed to profit from addicting adolescents to pornography, causing at least temporary brain damage that predisposes them to learning impairment and other increased cognitive difficulties. At the same time, these companies are facilitating the creation of millions of sexualized images of minors, which have migrated to the internet in a way that is nearly unstoppable.

Access to these apps, websites, and images can be stopped, and the pipeline of child porn can be turned off if the high-tech companies act now, or are compelled to act now, to keep nudify apps out of the hands of kids.

Written by Steve O’Keefe. First published September 1, 2026.

Sources:

“Pornography Addiction and Its Psychosocial Impacts in Adolescents,” Journal of Psychiatry, Psychology, and Behavioral Research, March 31, 2026.

“San Francisco Demands Apple and Google Delete AI ‘Nudify’ Apps From App Stores,” WIRED, July 17, 2026.

Online Pornography Addiction: Psychological, Neurocognitive, Social, and Legal Perspectives, by Geetika Saxena, Ruchika Dwivedi, and Richa Saxena, published by Uskudar University, Turkey, 2027.

“AI ‘nudify’ apps that can digitally undress any photo pose back-to-school risk,” CBS News, August 20, 2026.

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