Facebook Wants Your Nude Photos To Fight Revenge Porn — Is Scanning Naked Pictures A Lesser Of Two Evils?

Facebook has started a test program with nude pictures and if it proves fruitful in Australia, they will soon be recruiting naked photos of users in the U.S. and other nations where revenge porn has become a problem. So why would you possibly agree to send a naked picture of yourself to Facebook?

Revenge porn has become a modern-day problem, one that is not only embarrassing, but one that can have devastating repercussions on the victim’s life. With a camera and video recording device in just about everyone’s pocket and purse today via the cell phone, the opportunity for taking a nude intimate picture is just a click away.

At the time the picture is taken, the future of these photos are the furthest things from many peoples’ minds. But down the line, if a breakup occurs, there’s an opportunity for revenge porn and the numbers of cases are rising. Putting a nude picture of your ex-partner online where all your family, friends, and co-workers will see it can prove life-altering and Facebook officials are trying this new program as a way of fighting back.

Fox News pondered the question on their live broadcast Thursday whether or not this is a good idea. Even the big giants get hacked was one of their talking points. The other has to do with who will actually see this photos.

According to Techy, the program is designed to scan your photos and Facebook will use recognition technology to “hash” the pictures. Techy explains that this means Facebook will create a digital fingerprint of the photos. The way it works sounds rather easy as it is as simple as signing up and then sending your own nude photo to yourself via Messenger and Facebook puts their technology to use.

Right now a small government agency in Australia is working with Facebook on this pilot program, according to ABC Net. Their goal is to stop these intimate pictures from being shared on Facebook without the person’s consent. While the concept seems reasonable, Fox News debated whether sending your naked pictures to Facebook is the way to go. During their live coverage on Thursday, they described how this program works behind the scenes. Despite this being technology based, people are going to look at the photos to decide if they fit the criteria of this program.

Fox News was not the only ones who appeared skeptical of sending your nude pics to any social media site, even if it is under the umbrella of safeguard. Motherboard talked with a security researcher who claims using this program requires you putting an “enormous amount of trust in Facebook.”

As Fox News suggested, what happens if Facebook gets hacked? They also described how this program will work behind the scenes. There are a select group of professionals who will look at these photos, so it is not as if no one will see them. This group will decide if the picture meets the criteria for this program before it is scanned for their technology that will take down that photo in the future if it is posted on Facebook, Instagram, or Messenger.

The Guardian reported the steps taken with your photo.

“Users must first complete an online form on the e-safety commissioner’s website outlining their concerns. They will then be asked to send the pictures they are concerned about to themselves on Messenger while the e-safety commissioner’s office notifies Facebook of their submission. Once Facebook gets that notification, a community operations analyst will access the image and hash it to prevent future instances from being uploaded or shared.”

The debate is on — so is this the way to go? Should you become pro-active by sending your naked photos to Facebook before someone else posts them? Which is the lesser of two evils?

According to ABC Net, Julie Inman Grant of the e-Safety Commissioner has a lot of confidence that the safeguards put in place by Facebook will work to secure the photos once inside Facebook’s program. They’re not storing the image, they’re storing the link and using artificial intelligence and other photo-matching technologies.”

The sharing of non-consensual explicit images online may soon become a federal crime in this nation, reports Motherboard. As of right now, “there’s a patchwork of state laws” that are on the books for dealing with revenge porn.

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