Following the popularity — and controversy — of FaceApp, another face-swapping app is making the rounds with similar virality and privacy concerns. ZAO is the deepfake app that allows users to place their faces into scenes from popular movies and shows. While it's gone viral in China, the app is raising serious concerns over a perceived threat to user privacy.
The app launched in China on Friday August 30 and has already become the most downloaded app in China's iOS App Store. With a single uploaded image, the app is able to conjure convincing deepfake videos of famous movie moments. However, ZAO generated an almost-immediate backlash. Bloomberg reports that the privacy policy includes a clause which gives the developer a “free, irrevocable, permanent, transferable, and relicense-able” license to all user-generated content.
Users quickly flooded the App Store listing with negative reviews, forcing the company to quickly respond, saying it won’t use users’ data for anything other than app improvements without their consent.
Following a similar controversy as FaceApp from earlier this year, read up on the potential privacy threat of downloading such apps here.
