Russia-based face-changing application “FaceApp” took social media by storm last summer, as people used its filter to find out how they’d look like when they get old. Now, the app is back again with a gender-swapping function that transforms photos of faces into a different gender, and the filter has gone viral.
FaceApp may be a fun tool, but such facial recognition apps raise security concerns, and they could pose a threat to your privacy. Late last year, the FBI even issued a warning about the app, which enjoys access to millions of photos, calling FaceApp and some other apps developed in Russia a “potential counterintelligence threat.” To dispel doubts, FaceApp has clarified that photos will be deleted after editing.
“Photos remain in the cloud for 24 to 48 hours after you have last edited them,” the company claims, adding that it only uses third-party cloud providers to process its photos — such as Google Cloud Platform and Amazon Web Services.
Photo: Chien Jung-fong, Liberty Times 照片︰自由時報記者簡榮豐
(Eddy Chang, Taipei Times)
來自俄國的臉孔轉換應用程式「FaceApp」去年夏天席捲各大社群媒體，使用者紛紛透過它的變老濾鏡，查看自己變老的模樣。現在，這個程式又回來啦。不過這次是推出性別轉換功能，將臉部照片轉換成不同的性別，變性濾鏡近日推出後一夕爆紅。
雖然「FaceApp」很有趣，但是此類臉部辨識應用程式仍引發安全疑慮，還有可能對你的隱私造成威脅！去年底，美國聯邦調查局就針對掌握數百萬張臉部照片的「FaceApp」提出警告，說這類由俄國開發的程式具有「潛在情資威脅」。為了消除疑慮，該公司澄清說照片在編輯後將被刪除。
Photo courtesy of a netizen. 照片： 網友提供
該公司並宣稱︰「照片被編輯後，只會停留在雲端伺服器二十四至四十八小時。」還強調，只使用第三方雲端供應商來處理照片—像是Google Cloud Platform和Amazon Web Services。
（台北時報張聖恩〉
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