School division in Winnipeg creates protocols for dealing with intimate images

A woman types on a cellphone in this undated stock image. (Towfiqu barbhuiya/Pexels.com)

One school division in Winnipeg is putting new protocols in place for how to handle the sharing of intimate images, including those generated by artificial intelligence.

The Louis Riel School Division (LRSD) is implementing a policy for what steps students and staff must take if they receive an intimate image. This includes documenting how they got the image, where to report it and what to do next. The protocol also helps to avoid the forwarding of any images, in an effort to help avoid any further damage.

According to LRSD superintendent Christian Michalik in an interview on Wednesday, the protocol is part of an ongoing collaboration with police and the divisional legal counsel.

“[We] just wanted to be proactive and always learning from events,” he said in an interview on Wednesday.

“So we just recognized the need to equip staff and the community with the right information and resources and develop the protocol.

This policy comes just over a year after students at Collège Béliveau altered explicit photos of other students using artificial intelligence and shared them online.

Michalik said this policy is all about being prepared for any future incidents.

“We’re also always refining the services, the supports in place for students to, of course, be proactive and teach students and teach adults, as well, about online safety, digital citizenship, legal implications, our legal obligations, our moral obligations to each other and how we’re not alone as a school system.”

• With files from CTV’s Charles Lefebvre.