Facebook, under the Meta umbrella, is working on a new system to process private photos in users’ phone galleries. With this feature called “cloud processing,” photos are uploaded to Meta’s servers at regular intervals with user permission and analyzed by artificial intelligence.

Facebook will request access to photos in the gallery

The system comes into play when the user tries to create a new Story. The notification that appears on the screen asks whether you want to activate the “cloud processing” option and receive content suggestions. If approved, Facebook uploads the images in the gallery to the servers and begins analyzing the content with the help of artificial intelligence. The notification emphasizes that this data is only used for user-specific suggestions and not for ad targeting.

However, by clicking the “Allow” option, the user also accepts Meta’s Artificial Intelligence Terms of Service. According to these terms, facial features, date information, and object descriptions in uploaded photos can be processed by Meta’s artificial intelligence models.

Images can be subject to processes such as content summarization, rearrangement, or generating new images. It is also stated that the interactions between the user and the AI ​​can be reviewed by humans if necessary.

This application has brought to the agenda once again the ethical issues that could arise when technology giants use personal media content in AI development processes. In particular, access to private photos that users do not upload to the platform has raised questions about the extent to which privacy boundaries are protected.

Meta states that this content is only used to provide suggestions and is not used in training AI models. However, the company’s AI terms of service do not define a clear limit on this issue.