Documented investigations
ClothOff and ClothOff Alternatives: What Investigations Reveal
ClothOff is one of the most searched names in the undress AI category, and ClothOff alternative is one of its most common follow-up queries. Behind both searches sits a service that has been investigated by the Guardian, Bellingcat, CBS 60 Minutes and Der Spiegel, sued twice in the United States, and linked to abuse cases involving schoolgirls as young as 11. This page collects what is actually documented, with sources.
Key takeaways
- check_circleClothOff fabricates fake nude images of real people from clothed photos, without consent. The Guardian documented it inviting users to "undress anyone using AI."
- check_circleIts operators hid behind an AI generated fake CEO, masked payments through a gaming marketplace, and listed a fake office address, per Bellingcat and CBS 60 Minutes.
- check_circleFake nudes carrying the ClothOff logo circulated among schoolgirls in Almendralejo, Spain. The same app was at the center of the Westfield High School case in New Jersey.
- check_circleAnyone searching for a ClothOff alternative should know: lawsuits allege ClothOff is affiliated with more than a dozen similar services, so the "alternative" is often the same operator.
What is ClothOff?
ClothOff is an undress AI service: a user uploads a normal clothed photo of a real person, and the system fabricates a fake nude or sexualized image of that person. The output is synthetic, but the face belongs to someone real who never consented, which is why prosecutors classify the output as image based abuse and, when the subject is a minor, as child sexual abuse material.
According to the Guardian's reporting, the service invited users to "undress anyone using AI," asked only for a single click confirming the user was over 18, and sold bundles of roughly $10 for 25 generation credits. Spanish newspaper El Pais documented its marketing slogan: "Undress anybody with our free service." Images produced by the app have carried its fly logo as a watermark, which is how investigators identified it in real abuse cases.
Who is behind ClothOff? The investigation trail
For years the operators hid their identities. Four separate newsroom investigations and two US lawsuits have since mapped the operation: masked payments, a fake CEO, a fake address, and a network of sister services.
- February 23, 2024
Bellingcat maps the payment masking. Its investigation found ClothOff collecting payments through the gaming marketplace G2A, disguised as sales of downloadable game content. Bellingcat traced ClothOff into a loose network of similar platforms that had variously tried to route money through Coinbase, Patreon, PayPal, Shopify, Steam and Stripe, and identified a Valencia based figurehead linked to the network's companies.
- February 29, 2024
The Guardian's Black Box investigation. A six month investigation revealed that ClothOff's operators distorted their voices to answer media questions and presented an entirely AI generated person as their CEO. The reporting traced the operation toward Belarus and Russia, through businesses registered in Europe and front companies in London.
- 2024
CBS 60 Minutes checks the address. ClothOff listed a company called Grupo Digital in Buenos Aires. When 60 Minutes visited, the address belonged to the office of a politics YouTube channel whose staff had never heard of ClothOff. Bellingcat researcher Kolina Koltai told CBS the fake CEO's headshot appeared to be AI generated too.
- August 2024
San Francisco sues. City Attorney David Chiu filed a civil lawsuit against 16 of the most visited undress websites, ClothOff among them, citing more than 200 million visits to the group in the first half of 2024.
- July 2025
Der Spiegel's whistleblower. A former ClothOff employee told Der Spiegel the operators were "unimpressed" by the San Francisco lawsuit and had bought up a network of nudify apps instead. Reporters found a database accidentally left open on the internet that pointed to four central people behind the site, and noted internal communications were written in Russian.
- October 16, 2025
A victim sues in New Jersey. A federal complaint names AI/Robotics Venture Strategy 3 Ltd., registered in the British Virgin Islands, as the operator of ClothOff, and on information and belief names two Minsk residents as the people who developed, maintained and profited from it. The complaint alleges the service produced and sold non consensual sexual images of children and adults, and lists more than a dozen affiliated services by name.
Real abuse cases linked to ClothOff
ClothOff is not an abstract privacy debate. Its watermark has appeared on abuse material in documented police cases on two continents.
Schoolgirls as young as 11, images marked with the ClothOff logo
Mothers in Almendralejo discovered fake nude images of their daughters circulating in local WhatsApp groups. More than 20 girls were affected, some as young as 11, and images spread in at least four of the town's five middle schools. El Pais reported that one image carried a fly logo, the watermark of ClothOff, and the case went to the Juvenile Prosecutor's Office. Some victims were also blackmailed.
"The image is completely realistic. If I didn't know my daughter's body, I would have thought that image was real."
Westfield High School
Boys at Westfield High School created fake nude images of female classmates and shared them in a group chat. The Guardian's investigation placed the same app, ClothOff, at the center of both the New Jersey and the Spanish incidents. Families said the school had no policy for a crime that barely existed a year earlier, and the case triggered student walkouts.
A victim takes the operators to court
The October 2025 complaint was filed on behalf of a victim and seeks to hold the operating company and its alleged owners accountable for what it describes as the criminal and tortious operation of the ClothOff network. The filing is also notable for naming Telegram as a nominal defendant, describing the role of its platform in the service's distribution.
Searching for a ClothOff alternative? Read this first
There is no safe ClothOff alternative, for two documented reasons. First, any service whose core function is fabricating nudes of real people produces image based abuse, regardless of brand. Second, court filings and whistleblower reporting indicate the major "alternatives" are frequently run by the same network: the New Jersey complaint alleges ClothOff is affiliated with more than a dozen similar services, and Der Spiegel reported the operation had bought up at least 10 other nudify apps.
So a typical search for a ClothOff alternative leads in a circle: the same anonymous operators, the same masked payments, the same unknown photo retention, under a different logo. What does make sense depends on what you actually need:
If you want to edit your own photos
Legitimate photo editors (including AI tools from Adobe, Google and others) alter images you own or have consent to edit. What none of them do, by design, is fabricate sexual imagery of identifiable people, because that is the abusive part, not the editing part.
If someone used a service like this on you
The practical alternatives are removal and protection tools: StopNCII.org for adults and Take It Down from NCMEC for anyone under 18 in the original photo. Both create a digital fingerprint of the image on your device and share only the hash with partner platforms to block reuploads. Details in the victim help section below.
If you are researching this category
Our sister investigation covers the broader market: Nudify apps and undress AI nude tools: real cases and research, including the DeepNude origin story and the Graphika and Security Hero datasets.
Risks for people who use ClothOff
The documented risks fall on users as much as on victims: masked payments, unknown data practices, and growing prosecution.
Bellingcat documented ClothOff disguising charges as game purchases on G2A. A service that hides what you are paying for from your bank is telling you something about how it treats the rest of your data.
Every uploaded photo of another person lands on infrastructure run by operators who fielded a fake CEO and a fake address. There is no verifiable retention policy, and Der Spiegel already found one of their databases exposed on the open internet.
The Spanish case went to juvenile prosecutors, an Australian school case ended with an arrest, and the New Jersey lawsuit shows victims now suing the operators. Creating or sharing the output is a crime in a growing list of jurisdictions.
The New Jersey complaint explicitly accuses the service of producing child sexual abuse material. If the person in an uploaded photo is under 18, the output is treated as CSAM in the US, UK, EU and Australia, synthetic or not.
What to do if ClothOff was used on your photo
Act in this order: preserve evidence first, then limit spread, then report. Removal tools exist and are free.
- Preserve evidence. Screenshot the content, copy URLs and usernames, note dates, and keep the watermark visible in frame. Do this before reporting, because takedown deletes the evidence with the content.
- Stop the spread with hashing tools. If you are 18 or older, StopNCII.org creates a digital fingerprint of the image on your own device and shares only the hash with partner platforms, including Meta and TikTok. If the original photo was taken before you turned 18, use Take It Down from the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children.
- Report to the platform hosting the content. Every major platform now has a dedicated category for non consensual intimate imagery, synthetic included.
- Request removal from Google Search through its non consensual explicit imagery removal form, so the content stops surfacing even if a copy stays online.
- Report to police. Bring the preserved evidence. In the US, the Cyber Civil Rights Initiative runs a crisis helpline at 1-844-878-2274. The October 2025 New Jersey case shows victims can also pursue the operators in civil court.
FAQ
What is ClothOff?expand_more
ClothOff is one of the most visited undress AI services: it takes a clothed photo of a real person and fabricates a fake nude image of them. According to the Guardian, it invited users to undress anyone using AI and sold credit bundles. It has been linked by investigators to real abuse cases in Spain and New Jersey.
Who owns ClothOff?expand_more
The operators guarded their anonymity for years, distorting their voices in media calls and presenting an AI generated fake CEO. A 2025 lawsuit filed in New Jersey names the British Virgin Islands entity AI/Robotics Venture Strategy 3 Ltd. and, on information and belief, two Minsk residents as the people behind it. Der Spiegel reported that an exposed database pointed to four central individuals.
Is there a safe ClothOff alternative?expand_more
No service in this category is safe or legal for its core purpose, because fabricating nudes of real people without consent is image based abuse. Notably, a 2025 lawsuit alleges that ClothOff itself is affiliated with more than a dozen similar services, so an alternative is often the same operator under another brand. The only legitimate alternatives are consent based photo editors for your own images and, for victims, removal tools like StopNCII.org and Take It Down.
Is ClothOff legal?expand_more
San Francisco's city attorney sued ClothOff and other undress sites in August 2024, and a New Jersey federal complaint filed in October 2025 accuses the service of producing and selling non consensual sexual images of adults and children. Users also face risk: creating or sharing fake nudes of real people is a crime in many jurisdictions, and school cases in Spain and the US have led to juvenile prosecutions and arrests.
Is it safe to pay ClothOff or upload photos?expand_more
Documented reporting says no. Bellingcat found ClothOff collected payments through the gaming marketplace G2A disguised as downloadable game content, and CBS 60 Minutes found its listed Buenos Aires address belonged to an unrelated YouTube channel. A service that masks its payments and address offers no verifiable guarantee about where your card data or uploaded photos end up.
Was ClothOff used in real abuse cases?expand_more
Yes. In Almendralejo, Spain in 2023, fake nudes of more than 20 schoolgirls, some as young as 11, carried the ClothOff fly logo, according to El Pais. The Guardian reported the same app at the center of the Westfield High School case in New Jersey. The October 2025 New Jersey lawsuit was filed on behalf of a victim.
What do I do if ClothOff was used on my photo?expand_more
Preserve evidence first: screenshots, URLs, usernames, dates. Report the content to the hosting platform, create a hash of the image with StopNCII.org (adults) or Take It Down from NCMEC (under 18 in the original photo) to block reuploads, request removal from Google Search, and file a police report with the saved evidence.
Why does ClothOff keep changing domains and names?expand_more
Because payment processors, app stores and hosts keep cutting the service off. Investigators describe a rotating network of domains and affiliated brands that relaunch after each enforcement action, which is also why lawsuits name the operating entity rather than a single website.
Sources and further reading
- linkThe Guardian, Black Box investigation: "Revealed: the names linked to ClothOff, the deepfake pornography app," February 29, 2024 (theguardian.com).
- linkBellingcat, "Behind a Secretive Global Network of Non-Consensual Deepfake Pornography," February 23, 2024 (bellingcat.com).
- linkCBS News / 60 Minutes, reporting on nudify sites' payment redirects and ClothOff's Buenos Aires address, 2024 (cbsnews.com).
- linkDer Spiegel whistleblower reporting on ClothOff's network, covered by Ars Technica, July 2025 (arstechnica.com).
- linkEl Pais, reporting on the Almendralejo case and the ClothOff fly logo, September 2023 (elpais.com).
- linkSan Francisco City Attorney David Chiu, lawsuit against 16 undress websites, August 2024 (sfcityattorney.org).
- linkFederal complaint against AI/Robotics Venture Strategy 3 Ltd. d/b/a ClothOff, District of New Jersey, October 16, 2025 (public court filing).
- linkGraphika, report on synthetic NCII providers, December 2023 (graphika.com).
- linkStopNCII.org (adults) and Take It Down by NCMEC (minors), image hashing tools (stopncii.org, takeitdown.ncmec.org).