- cross-posted to:
- technology@beehaw.org
- cross-posted to:
- technology@beehaw.org
Instagram is profiting from several ads that invite people to create nonconsensual nude images with AI image generation apps, once again showing that some of the most harmful applications of AI tools are not hidden on the dark corners of the internet, but are actively promoted to users by social media companies unable or unwilling to enforce their policies about who can buy ads on their platforms.
While parent company Meta’s Ad Library, which archives ads on its platforms, who paid for them, and where and when they were posted, shows that the company has taken down several of these ads previously, many ads that explicitly invited users to create nudes and some ad buyers were up until I reached out to Meta for comment. Some of these ads were for the best known nonconsensual “undress” or “nudify” services on the internet.
Does it really matter though? “Well you see, they didn’t actually see you naked, it was just a photorealistic approximation of what you would look like naked”.
At that point I feel like the lines get very blurry, it’s still going to be embarrassing as hell, and them not being “real” nudes is not a big comfort when having to confront the fact that there are people masturbating to your “fake” nudes without your consent.
I think in a few years this won’t really be a problem because by then these things will be so widespread that no one will care, but right now the people being specifically targeted by this must not be feeling great.
It depends very much on the individual apparently. I don’t have a huge data set but there are girls that I know that have had this has happened to them, and some of them have just laughed it off and really not seemed like they cared. But again they were in their mid twenties not 18 or 19.