Chances are that you have also joined the latest ChatGPT trend that has people turning their personal photographs into retro-looking images inspired by the 1980s . From vintage hairstyles and outfits to old-school colours and film-like textures, users increasingly catching on the trend to AI-generate 80s’ versions of themselves.
But as the trend goes viral, it also raises a familiar question – how safe is it to upload a personal photograph, particularly one showing your face, to an AI chatbot?
Because of the richness of the data people supply,” Forbes quoted him as saying, it does not independently search the internet for personal details about an individual, but the output quality can give the impression of deep personal insight. Privacy concerns around AI-generated images are not new. Moore also warned about what happens after users upload photographs and personal details to an AI chatbot. “This information gets stored and is used to train these impressive models alongside unclear long term uses. Conlon warns. Linnell also explained that the apparent personalisation of an AI-generated image does not necessarily mean the chatbot has independently gathered information about the person. “To generate a caricature, ChatGPT relies on content actively provided by the user, such as uploaded images, prompts, and descriptive information.
“When you upload photos and personal details to a chatbot such as ChatGPT, the platform “collects all of this information and analyses it,” says Moore. “While entering your data to create the ChatGPT caricature feels harmless and fun, this behavior “raises serious data privacy concerns and could increase the risk of identity theft in the future. “Once that information is uploaded, there’s no guarantee it can be fully removed or controlled,” Forbes quoted him as saying.
Earlier viral trends, including the ChatGPT Ghibli-style as well as caricature image craze, have been among the times that prompted cybersecurity and privacy experts to warn users about the amount of personal information they were voluntarily handing over to AI platforms. During the earlier Ghibli-style image trend as well, which went viral in April last year – concerns about users voluntarily uploading personal photographs to OpenAI’s chatbot were raised.
