Alleged Fake AI-Generated Christmas Card Featuring Prince Harry and Meghan Markle's Children Circulates on Social Media

An AI-generated Christmas card reportedly depicting Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s children, Prince Archie and Princess Lilibet, was shared on social media as if it were authentic. The image is reported to have been created using older public photos and flawed AI editing.

Risk classification

• Primary risk domain: 3 Misinformation
• Primary risk subdomain: 3.1 False or misleading information

The incident involved the creation and viral spread of a fabricated Christmas card containing AI-generated fake images of real children, misleading some social media users.

Additional risk subdomains

• 4.3 Fraud, scams, and targeted manipulation: The creator used AI to impersonate the royal children and fabricate an official family greeting card, exploiting their likenesses.

Causal factors

• Entity: Human
• Intent: Intentional
• Timing: Post-deployment

The incident was initiated by a human user who intentionally generated and posted a fake Christmas card using a deployed AI tool.

EU AI Act risk tier

• Risk tier: 3 Limited Risk

Limited Risk: The incident involves an AI-generated deepfake image of public figures' children, which falls under the category of AI-generated content requiring transparency obligations.

AI system and alleged parties

• AI system: None named
• AI purpose: Deepfake Image Generation; Image Generation
• Behaviour type: Tool
• Alleged developer: Unknown AI graphic tool developer
• Alleged deployer: X user pdina, X (Twitter) users
• Alleged harmed parties: Princess Lilibet, Prince Harry, Prince Archie, Meghan Markle

Harm severity

Severity ratings are based on this scale.

Highest direct severity in any category: Minor. Severity is scored from Negligible to Catastrophic in each harm category, for harm the reports describe as caused directly or indirectly by the AI system.

• Physical: direct Negligible, indirect Negligible
• Infrastructure: direct Negligible, indirect Negligible
• Property: direct Negligible, indirect Negligible
• Financial: direct Negligible, indirect Negligible
• Environmental: direct Negligible, indirect Negligible
• Malicious content: direct Minor, indirect Negligible
• Differential treatment: direct Negligible, indirect Negligible
• Civil rights: direct Negligible, indirect Negligible
• Democracy: direct Negligible, indirect Negligible
• Privacy: direct Negligible, indirect Negligible
• Psychological: direct Negligible, indirect Negligible
• Epistemic: direct Minor, indirect Negligible
• Child sexual exploitation and abuse: direct Negligible, indirect Negligible

Malicious content

Reported: Yes, the reports describe the viral spread of a fake, AI-generated Christmas card of the royal children, which users described as 'creepy', 'weird', and 'disgusting'.

Directly caused: The AI-generated image was directly created and spread on X, reaching a large online audience and causing public outrage.

Epistemic

Reported: Yes, the reports describe the creation and viral spread of a fabricated, fake Christmas card that misled some social media users into believing it was real.

Directly caused: The fake card featured forged black-and-white photos of Prince Archie and Princess Lilibet, presenting a completely fabricated scenario as real.

Inferred additional harm: The incident contributes to the broader erosion of trust in online imagery and official communications from public figures.

People affected

• Occurrences reported: 1
• People reportedly harmed: 4
• People reportedly exposed: 4

Potential causes

Management

• Inadequate Platform Moderation: X failed to quickly detect and label the AI-generated fake image.
• Reactive Moderation Policies: Platform relied on users requesting Community Notes rather than prevention.

Technology

• AI Generation Limitations: AI tools struggle to render realistic hands, feet, and proportional eyes.
• Sloppy Digital Editing: Errors like warped floor tiles and distorted clothes showed poor rendering.

Data Inputs

• Lack of Current Training Data: No current public photos of children's faces existed for the model.
• Use of Outdated Public Photos: Older public photos of the kids were edited to construct the fake portrait.

Human Factors

• Malicious or Troll Intent: A royal fan or troll created the fake image to deceive or gain attention.
• User Confirmation Bias: Some social media users believed the fake image due to confirmation bias.
• Public Curiosity About Kids: The parents' decision to hide faces fueled public desire for images.

Process and Methods

• Viral Sharing Mechanisms: X platform algorithms allowed unverified fake content to go viral quickly.
• Lack of Pre-Publishing Checks: No screening process existed to block AI deepfakes before publication.

Regulatory Environment

• Weak Deepfake Regulations: Lack of legal frameworks to govern AI-generated deepfakes of minors.

Information quality

• Classification confidence: High
• Reason for confidence: The reports consistently describe the viral fake Christmas card, the public reaction on X, and the details of the image's flaws. There is high agreement across sources that the image was a digital forgery.
• Ambiguities identified: The specific AI tool used to generate the image is not identified, and the exact identity or motivation of the creator remains unconfirmed.
• Alternative interpretations: Some users suggested the card was created by fans, while others claimed it was created by trolls to mock the family.

An AI-generated fake Christmas card of Prince Archie and Princess Lilibet went viral on social media, causing public outrage over privacy and digital forgery. The incident represents a minor celebrity-focused deepfake with negligible national security implications.

• Overall national security impact: Negligible
• Scope: Single nation
• Primary target: United Kingdom
• Alleged perpetrator: Unknown

Threat characteristics

• Imminence: Long-term. The incident represents a minor, localized event with no active crisis or immediate national security threat.
• Autonomy: Human-controlled. A human user actively prompted the AI tool to generate the image and manually posted it to social media.
• Novelty: Established threat. The creation of deepfakes and synthetic images of public figures is a well-established and common occurrence.

Impact by dimension

• Physical security: Negligible. No physical systems, critical infrastructure, or human safety elements were affected or targeted in this incident.
• Information security: Negligible. While the incident involved synthetic media, it was a low-quality celebrity deepfake rather than a coordinated information warfare campaign targeting national security.
• Sovereignty: Negligible. The incident did not impact state authority, electoral processes, or core government operations, involving only personal likenesses of non-working royal family members.
• Economic security: Negligible. There was no impact on financial systems, strategic technologies, supply chains, or national economic security.
• Societal stability: Negligible. The incident caused localized online outrage and personal privacy concerns for the family, but posed no threat to broader societal stability or civil liberties.