AI images are going viral all the time, whether it's the Pope in a fluffy jacket or anything else, and many people across the world are getting fooled by these kinds of pics making the rounds online. With the power of AI, it's oftentimes hard to tell what's real and what's fake when it comes to online content, so the question arises: Should you worry about AI images?
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What's Possible With AI Images?
Basically anything is possible in terms of image creation with AI. With the right AI tools, you can generate a photorealistic image of just about anybody doing anything, however whacky or ridiculous. You can also do this with sexual content, which tends to fall under the deepfake umbrella.
It is true that you've got to be careful with what kind of AI tool you use, and you may well have to do some Photoshop work after the fact if the AI image you've generated has an extra hand or finger or something along those lines, but the point here is that you can create any kind of image with AI.
A skilled digital artist with a lot of Photoshop experience may well be able to create just about any image they'd like, too, but this is a considerably more labor-intensive process that relatively few out there have the skill to be able to do well enough to pass off as real. However, AI is different.
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With just a little know-how, just about anybody can use AI to create any image they like, and if everybody has the power to create a realistic-looking image of anybody doing anything, well, you can imagine how that can get out of control a lot faster than if just a few folks out there can do such a thing.
Why We Should Worry About AI Images
The big problem with AI images comes down to misinformation and how fast it can spread on the internet.
For example, imagine a mainstream news publication, like CNN or FOX, publishes a news story with an AI-generated image. Whoever wrote the story didn't do their due diligence and mistakenly assumed that the AI image was actually a real image. Quickly after the story goes, it gets taken down.
It only takes a few messages for the writer to realize their mistake, so you might think the harm done is relatively minor. The problem, though, is that the image and the following story instantly take on another life online. And the fact of the matter is that a tiny percentage of people who saw the original, fake story will come back to see the update that it's fake.
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The point here is that even if an AI image is quickly identified as a fake it can still spread around on the internet like wildfire and very few people who see the image will ever know that it was faked. In this sense, easy-to-generate AI images that can be posted online can be quite dangerous.
When it comes to AI-generated sexual content, i.e. deepfakes, not only is the above problem an issue but there's the extra layer of the person who was deepfaked getting harassed or feeling objectified by countless strangers on the internet leering at what they think to be their naked body.
Why We Shouldn't Worry About AI Images
On the other hand, as mentioned above, fake pictures have been around for a long time. Over the course of the last 25 years, well, there have been loads of crazy Photoshopped images that countless people have believed were real, and not too much terrible damage to society has been done.
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Yes, it's concerning that it's much easier to generate fakes with AI, and yes it's not good how fast misinformation can spread online, but that might not be the end of the world, either way. If we managed to survive COVID-19 misinformation, for example, it stands to reason we'll be able to deal with fake images created by AI being passed around.
What's more, though, is that AI fakes, if they're made quickly by lazy people, can also be spotted by looking for imperfections, too. If you take a closer look at an image going around and notice some weird blurring or distortion around a hand or some fingers, for example, you can assume it may be a fake.
Plus, we already live in the age of the internet. If we're being honest, it's already hard to tell if anything's real or fake when you're stumbling across it on the internet. As a default rule of thumb, it's usually probably best to assume anything you see or hear is fake unless it comes from a reliable source you can trust, or at least can be traced back to such a source.
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