This July’s pictures were definitely different from last year’s. Oh sure, the watermelon looked just as juicy, the water play looked just as fun, and the water bottles looked just as cold. But this summer you looked old. Really old.
Not everyone chose to upload a selfie and send it forty years into the future with the FaceApp, but many did. That choice soon became clouded in regret for many as a new privacy, and Russian, scare took over the news cycle.
So did you sell your soul and help Russia destroy democracy when you used technology to see the future? No. Not at all.
Your decision to upload a picture or two hasn’t opened you up to any more significant amount of hacking or manipulation than your everyday use of social media. While FaceApp has been news, and some of your more paranoid friends crowed about how they knew the truth and they hadn’t been fooled, you actually haven’t been fooled either.
USA Today had this to say in their article about privacy concerns: “Facebook’s past is riddled with privacy controversy1, and the social networking giant has way more information about its users than a selfie or two.. updating your status on Facebook to express your concerns about FaceApp is the digital equivalent to jumping in the ocean and complaining about getting wet.”
So no panic needed over FaceApp and their supposed diabolical plans to conquer the world using pictures of ordinary folks who now look like senior citizens. Here’s a tech tip to make your future selfies better: smile more. That way those wrinkles, when they show up for real, are in all the right places.
Sources:
1. https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2019/04/26/facebook-bans-personality-quizzes-could-access-your-personal-info/3585286002/
2. https://faceapp.com/privacy
3. https://www.facebook.com/policy.php
