In other truly rattling news that is not the horrific and homophobic post from Israel Folau, an app has launched with the sole purpose of using AI to turn photographs of women into naked photographs of the same women.
As reported by Vice, DeepNude’s software swaps clothes for naked breasts and a vagina. It only does this for images of women (Motherboard tested it and it replaced a man’s pants with a vagina.
Marketed as “the super power you always wanted,” the app exploits and dehumanises women.
Thankfully, DeepNude only launched as a website and downloadable app on June 23 and a day after receieving widespread attention, its developers have shut it down.
Today, DeepNude said the software will no longer be offered for sale and further versions won’t be released.
DeepNude released a statement, which partly said: “We thought we were selling a few sales every month in a controlled manner”.
This statement in itself is utterly ridiculous. Not only will the app not stop other DeepNudes ‘bad actors’ from propagating, the thought that the original developers had any kind of ethical agenda is laughable.
Read DeepNude’s full statement below:
The creator of the DeepNude app, who called himself Alberto in his communications with Vice, said he was inspired by old comic book adverts for “X-ray specs”. “Like everyone, I was fascinated by the idea that they could really exist and this memory remained,” he said.
Speaking to Vice, attorney Carrie Goldberg said: “It’s incumbent on the public to avoid consumption of what we call at my office humili-porn. Whether it’s revenge porn or deepfakes, don’t click or link or share or like! That’s how these sites make money.”
