The US Defence Department has expressed concern that the publication of the photographs could inflame violence in the Muslim world at a time when tensions are already high following the publication of cartoons depicting the Prophet Mohammed in Europe.
The images and video footage, apparently part of an even larger collection, depict shocking mistreatment of Iraqi detainees at the notorious Iraqi jail at the hands of US military officials.
Naked men are shown forced into sexually humiliating positions, handcuffed to beds and hooded.
Some show men bleeding profusely from the head, others apparently show corpses, and yet others show men smeared with faeces.
The US said only one image could not be authenticated as it had no people in it, but "the other 14 can be matched to a CID photo log and are authentic," said a Pentagon official , speaking on condition of anonymity, according to an AFP report.
The CID is the army criminal investigation unit that probed the abuse scandal.
The images were picked up by media around the world, including television networks in the Arab world.
Human rights group Amnesty International has called for a full, independent investigation.
"The repulsive images released today give a clearer picture of the scope of abuses perpetrated at Abu Ghraib and raise the question of what other abuses occurred there and elsewhere when cameras weren't present," it said in a statement.
The UN also said it hopes the new pictures will be investigated.
"All these pictures are deeply disturbing and we would hope they are investigated as soon as possible," UN chief Kofi Annan's spokesman Stephane Dujarric told reporters.
Abuses uncovered at Abu Ghraib prison in 2004 sparked a dozen investigations and reviews related to the military treatment of detainees.
Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman told AFP that more than 200 people were held accountable for misconduct, in an investigation that went beyond incidents at Abu Ghraib.
He said 25 of them were held accountable for criminal acts and other "failures" at Abu Ghraib.
These include Lynndie England and Charles Graner, who have appeared in many of the photographs.
Prosecutors said Graner, who received a 10 year jail sentence, was the ringleader in the scandal, however Graner has maintained that he was ordered by superiors to abuse the prisoners.
Mr Whitman said the latest photographs were part of a much larger set of images handed to authorities in 2004 by whistleblower Specialist Joseph Darby.
Dateline executive producer Mike Carey has not said how the photos were obtained, but said they may have also been accessible by other journalists.
Mr Carey said some images showing sexual humiliation were deemed too graphic to be aired.
Iraq's Human Rights Minister Nermeen Othman said the situation at Abu Ghraib has improved since the pictures were taken.
"There has not been any case of torture except one about a month ago," she told Al-Arabiya television.
"There has been a change in the American policy towards Iraqi detainees."
US forces have been in Iraq since 2003, when they led an invasion to overthrow Saddam Hussein.
The official investigations blamed the abuse on a breakdown of unit discipline at Abu Ghraib, unrelated to official policy.
Critics have denounced the military's failure to punish senior military leaders, and have called for an independent investigation.
The highest ranking officer to be punished for the crisis was Brigadier General Janis Karpinski, who commanded Abu Ghraib during the period in 2003 and 2004 when the abuses occurred.
She was relieved of command and demoted to colonel after an investigation found her guilty of shoplifting and dereliction of duty. She said she was being made a scapegoat.
The army's inspector general cleared Lieutenant General Ricardo Sanchez, the commander in Iraq at the time, and other senior officers in the chain of command.