De Leon: FaceApp: The new way to get old

IF YOU’VE been on social media in the last few days then you can’t have failed to notice it - FaceApp is everywhere.

Regardless of being launched debut way back in 2017, the app has unexpectedly received a new spark of viral life.

But as quickly as it has took off, the qualms about what the people behind it is actually doing with our photos and our privacy have followed too. So, is it time to fret?

Let’s see. But first, what is FaceApp again?

In case you’re living under a rock, FaceApp is the hottest new trend. It's a mobile phone application (app) that takes people’s photos and executes some digital wizardry to modify faces through heaps of entertaining filters.

But the old age filter has become mostly popular because it is available for use in the app for free. And it’s pretty awesome too as it’s able to produce highly compelling output.

So what is it, then, about an app that makes us look aged that’s so compelling? Conceivably, in a youth-obsessed society where old age is cast as objectionable, FaceApp lets us safely picture ourselves as aged. (It’s us with our younger bodies, just with a face full of wrinkles and salt-and-pepper hair.) And since everybody’s doing it, the embarrassing part recedes hence; we became so insistent on sharing it.

Consequently, what makes people worried are two things: First, the app has access to all of the photos on our phones, so if developers chose to do so, they could possibly tell the app to upload all or our photos to their servers, or pass them on to other organizations.

Second, the company that makes the app, Wireless Lab, is based in St Petersburg, Russia. Yes, Russia.

Nonetheless, despite the initial worries, indications suggest that the app is behaving responsibly. A number of other experts have examined what is being transmitted, and have concluded that all the app is uploading are the photos that the user chooses to apply filters to.

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