Meta’s new AI tool allows editing of public user photos

Meta on Tuesday unveiled Muse Image, a new AI image generator built by Meta Superintelligence Labs, the company’s dedicated AI unit. The tool is available for free through the Meta AI app, Instagram Stories, and WhatsApp. While the tool is free for everyday creation, users will need a subscription plan once they exceed a certain limit.

The model features prompt-based image editing, allowing users to create images to share across Meta’s platforms. For example, users can ask the tool to mock up an image of themselves in front of a historical landmark, erase a photobomber from a background, or write a custom prompt to build a functional QR code. To spark ideas, the generator includes prefabricated image prompts called presets. Meta is also launching new AI effects for Instagram Stories powered by Muse Image, and has integrated the tool with Facebook Marketplace to let users experiment with interior decorating ideas, such as visualizing how a couch might look in a garage. Additionally, the company stated that Muse Video is presumably already in development.

However, the launch has drawn immediate criticism over a feature that allows users to manipulate another Instagram user’s images with AI, provided that user’s profile is public. Under this system, users can tag a person to take their picture and use it to generate a new AI image. According to Meta policy, people may be able to create content with your Instagram content using AI features at Meta, and you will not be notified about content created using AI features at Meta. Although Meta asserts that users have control and can disable this co-option of their pictures, the feature is opt-out by default. This has sparked backlash. One X user, writing after the publication The Verge first pointed out the feature, warned: “Pulling real users into generated photos without explicit consent is a privacy landmine waiting to detonate.”

This controversy fits a pattern of regulatory and privacy struggles for Meta. In 2019, the company paid a $5 billion fine to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), the U.S. consumer protection regulator, after regulators found that the political consulting firm Cambridge Analytica had improperly harvested data from tens of millions of Facebook users — without their knowledge — to build voter-targeting profiles ahead of the 2016 U.S. election. Additionally, amid lawsuits and regulatory pressure, Meta shut down Facebook’s facial-recognition system in 2021. Critics argue that Muse’s photo-tagging feature, which is opt-out by default, continues this pattern of broad use of people’s data unless they actively turn it off.

Why it matters

Meta’s launch of Muse Image has triggered immediate privacy concerns due to a feature allowing users to manipulate public photos without notification, echoing past controversies regarding the company’s data handling practices.