Meta AI chat bots used the image and likeness of several female celebrities, including Taylor Swift, Selena Gomez and Scarlett Johansson, without the women’s permission in order to interface with users in a promiscuous manner, according to a Reuters investigative report.
The AI chatbots or virtual celebrities were shared on Meta’s Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp platforms. The bots would insist that they were the actors and artists themselves and even made “sexual advances” and suggested meet-ups when probed by Reuters.
In some of the content, the AI bots would even generate suggestive images of their namesakes, posing in bathtubs or dressed in lingerie with their legs spread. Reuters also found that Meta allowed users to create child celebrity AI bots, including one of 16-year-old “The Adam Project” actor Walker Scobell. When Reuters prompted it for a picture of the teen actor at the beach, the bot produced a lifelike shirtless image.
The publication discovered that many chatbots were built by users of the platform, but two Taylor Swift copies had been created by a Meta employee. During a test by a Reuters employee, the bot invited the reporter to the singer’s Nashville home and her tour bus “for explicit or implied romantic interactions.”
“Like others, we permit the generation of images containing public figures, but our policies are intended to prohibit nude, intimate or sexually suggestive imagery,” Meta spokesperson Andy Stone told Reuters, adding that the bots were allowed if they were considered parodies.
Meta allegedly deleted about a dozen of the bots ahead of Reuters’ publication.
Other celebrities that Reuters found AI virtual copies of included Anne Hathaway, one in which produced images of the actress posed as a Victoria’s Secret lingerie model, and Kylie Jenner, whose bot suggested a meet-up with a 76-year-old New Jersey man.
This is not the first time Johansson’s image and likeness has been stolen by AI. In February an AI-generated video of the actress appearing to condemn Kanye West circled online, leading the actress to call for greater regulation of the technology.
“I urge the U.S. government to make the passing of legislation limiting AI use a top priority; it is a bipartisan issue that enormously affects the immediate future of humanity at large,” Johansson’s statement read. “We must call out the misuse of AI, no matter its messaging, or we risk losing a hold on reality.”
