Plenty has been said about how amazing the modern age is and how we’re all carrying more powerful computers in our pockets than what guided men to the Moon. But as serious as that is, what would life be without crushing a few candies or flinging some very ornery birds at some egg-thieving pigs?
Our phones do just about everything we ask of them, but we don’t always consider what cost that comes with this. One popular app might be asking a bit more than folks realize.
It wasn’t that long ago that everyone was using an app on their phones to see what they’d look like as a member of the opposite gender.
Snapchat’s gender swapping filter went about as viral as anything ever goes. And why not? It was fun to see, a novelty.
The next big thing is using an app to see how you might look a few decades down the line.
Everybody wants to get in on the act.
Again, it’s a novelty to get an estimation of all the wrinkles and liver spots and gray hairs you can expect to see in your future. Many celebs have shared pics of themselves through the FaceApp.
However, they and the millions of others who use the app might have forked over more than they realized when they agreed to use it.
Now, FaceApp itself has been in the news before.
A couple of years ago, the company made headlines for allowing users to edit their photos to appear as different ethnicities, basically creating digital blackface.
The company soon removed those filters from its app.
Now that FaceApp is trending again, it has come under a bit more scrutiny.
Specifically, someone decided to actually read the terms and conditions rather than simply skipping over them and found that users have agreed to share a startling amount of data with the company.
What’s more, FaceApp might be able to access some things it shouldn’t be able to.
Some users have noticed the app picking photos from their library even when it shouldn’t be able to.
As TechCrunch noted , this is a feature included with iOS 11, and it can actually only access one, single photo, and you have to tap that photo to allow it.
It’s a feature, not a bug, but it’s still a bit sketchy that it does that even when your photo access is set to “Never,” however.
Even if you’re cool with that, you might not be so happy with FaceApp privacy and user content policies.
The app could collect more than just your pics.
“You’re getting the access to your phone so all of your contacts, all of your pictures. Once you allow that you are giving away everything,” said ABC News’s chief business correspondent Rebecca Jarvis. “That’s how they’re paying for it, free isn’t actually free, they’re giving away your information.”
All that sensitive information goes to the company, which is headquartered in St. Petersburg, Russia.
“FaceApp’s privacy page also says they may share user content and your information with businesses that are legally part of the same group of companies,” said ABC News chief business correspondent Rebecca Jarvis.
So any company associated with FaceApp also has access to that data.
At present, FaceApp has about 80 million users.
According to TechCrunch, FaceApp has responded to the privacy concerns, stating that it does not send data back to Russia or sell data to third parties, and stores photos in the cloud and deletes images from their database within 48 hours of a user uploading them.
They also said they accept requests from users to delete their data.
h/t ABC News , TechCrunch
