Photographers’ complaints lead Meta to revise AI-generated image labels on Facebook, Instagram

Earlier this year, Meta introduced a new label — “made with AI” — for images generated by AI. The company’s Oversight Board had criticised Meta over its manipulated media policy and Meta introduced these labels. However, there were many complaints from photographers who suggested that Meta was labelling images that weren’t generated by AI. Photos that were edited in Adobe Photoshop’s generative AI tool were also labelled incorrectly by Meta.

Now, Meta has announced that it is changing the labels once again. Meta said that it wants people to know when they see posts that have been made with AI. An important part of labelling AI-generated image, as per Meta, relies on industry standard indicators that other companies include in content created using their tools, “which help us assess whether something is created using AI,” the company said.

“Like others across the industry, we’ve found that our labels based on these indicators weren’t always aligned with people’s expectations and didn’t always provide enough context,” explained the company.

Citing an example — but without naming Photoshop — Meta said that some content that included minor modifications using AI, such as retouching tools, included industry standard indicators that were then labeled “Made with AI.” “While we work with companies across the industry to improve the process so our labelling approach better matches our intent, we’re updating the “Made with AI” label to “AI info” across our apps, which people can click for more information,” Meta said.