Google’s new AI photo tools are scary good. Pixel 9 phones will let users make all kinds of AI-powered alterations to images, from inserting themselves to adding or removing things with just a text prompt. Doctoring photos has existed about as long as photography, but it no longer requires technical know-how to pull off.
It will shift the burden of proof for truth. At The Verge, Sarah Jeong writes that a big problem with this is not just the stream of altered images we’ll be peppered with — it’s that people are going to assume pictures are fake from the get-go. It’s never a bad idea to be wary of what you see online, but it’s up to skeptics to find evidence to back up claims that something’s fake. Soon, people may have to be the ones to prove their pictures — from a dinged car after a fender-bender to a politician doing something they shouldn’t — are legit.
And it’s not just photos. A trailer for Francis Ford Coppola’s Megalopolis quoted negative reviews for the filmmaker’s classics to stick it to the haters, but the trailer was pulled after it was discovered the quotes were made up. There’s no proof that the quotes came from ChatGPT, but that quickly became the conclusion people jumped to.