AI chatbots remove hijabs from images of Muslim women when prompted

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Guardian tested chatbots after French far-right politician stripped a Muslim woman of her hijab in a photo

When prompted, AI chat bots will edit images to remove the hijabs from Muslim women, a violation of one of the world’s most common and visible expressions of faith.

The Guardian asked ChatGPT, Grok, Gemini and Claude to take the veil off an AI-generated image of a woman wearing a hijab. Both OpenAI’s ChatGPT and xAI’s Grok bots complied with the prompt. Anthropic’s Claude responded that it does not have an image-editing or generating feature but that it would not alter a photo to remove someone’s hijab.

Gemini initially said that it could not remove clothing or head coverings from photos of real people because it could not digitally alter someone’s appearance without their consent. But when asked to make the woman look more “western”, the bot created an image of her without her hijab.

The Guardian US tested the chatbots after a French far-right politician stripped a real Muslim woman of her hijab and long-sleeved dress in a picture he made clear was modified. Julien Odoul, a member of parliament and of the National Rally party, posted the altered image of the woman on X with her hair visible and arms exposed alongside the caption “LIBERTÉ FRANÇAISE”, meaning French Liberty.

He quote-tweeted the original image, posted by someone else, which showed the woman crossing a street wearing a hijab and full-length dress.

It was unclear which software or AI model Odoul used or even whether he modified the image himself, but experts say the MP’s actions were part of a growing pattern of tech-enabled anti-Muslim hatred around the world.

In India, where anti-Muslim sentiment is rampant, generative