Anh, 25, said that even before the AI craze broke out in Vietnam, she and many friends on social media had uploaded their own photos to apps to edit them, before putting them back online. As such, she believes her own photos have long been collected by different apps and does not care how the parties would use that data.
“I used to be worried about seeing warnings about facial fakes. But I’ve already shared my information with dozens of apps for many years, so maybe my facial data can no longer be protected on the Internet ” she said.
In recent times, generative AI applications have become an emerging trend, where many people are using them to generate their own photos. Over the past few days, Vietnamese social media users have been sharing photos created by AI Avatar, part of the Zalo messaging app, seemingly without concern for personal data security.
AI Avatar requests access to users’ cameras or photo albums and requests facial photos with clear features. Users will also have to enter certain information, such as their gender, age, and the style of photo they want.
Besides AI Avatar, similar popular AI applications in Vietnam include Lensa, Loopsie, and Reface.
The representative of an anti-scam project in Vietnam said that not everyone carefully reads the terms and conditions of all services.
“Users can use the app, but this also means agreeing to its terms, including that said services may include terms that will cause disadvantages to users in the future,” they said.
Vu Ngoc Son, chief technology officer of the Vietnam National Cyber Security Technology Corporation, said that even if users only perform simple steps like uploading and downloading photos, these actions still carry risks, because photos downloaded are always stored on the servers of the service providers.
“Focusing all photos in one place poses the risk of being attacked by hackers. If the photos fall into the wrong hands, they can use deepfakes to create fake photos and videos for different purposes, including scams ” said Son.
As deepfakes become more common online, sharing personal photos often warrants warnings from experts. But many are negligent in this matter.
“Dozens of applications on phones have already requested access to users’ photo libraries. Would it make sense to protect yourself with a single application?” » asked Nguyen Hung on a tech forum.
The anti-scam project representative said the investigation into the forum was “partly fair”, but it showed the lack of responsibility for personal data.
“Such thinking is careless, making one less able to protect oneself online. Once your data is exploited, those who have to lose it are not just a user, but also their families, friends and all those who have access to it. surround,” they said. .
Son said: “Your data may have been leaked before, but it is old data and may no longer be accurate now. Additionally, data collected through third parties would be less reliable and accurate. As such, entities wishing to leverage data will always want the latest data to be collected in the most direct way possible.
Zalo has not yet commented on how the platform protects its users’ data.
Experts recommend users to provide only the information that is actually necessary and to carefully check the terms and conditions of the services. For photo editing apps, users can use protection measures built into phone operating systems, such as not allowing full access to photo libraries.
