Instagram Develops AI Face Swap to Rival OpenAI’s Sora

Instagram may soon launch a feature that would enable it to rival the Sora app from OpenAI. A tipster reports that Meta is working on a face swap feature for its platform, enabling users to generate AI images and videos from their own likeness. It is also reported that users would be able to request other users’ likenesses. Although the feature appears to be fairly similar to what the Sora app offers, there may be some differences in how it is implemented.

The feature, “Create My Likeness”, an AI-powered tool that Instagram is apparently working on, would let users digitally add their faces to AI-generated images and videos. This move puts Meta in a direct competitive position with Sora from OpenAI, which just released a social app with a comparable “characters” function. 

“Instagram is working on an #AI-powered face swap feature,” tipster Alessandro Paluzzi wrote in a post on X (previously known as Twitter). Screenshots of the new tool were also given by him. Interestingly, the screenshots refer to it as “Create my likeness”, even though the tipster labelled it a face swap function.

The screenshots suggest that an Instagram user will automatically have access to their likeness. It’s unclear if they would need to upload a selfie in order to activate the function, or if the data would be pulled from their posts and highlights. However, once they have access to it, they can use AI to create images and movies by writing a prompt. Although it’s unclear, they might also be able to publish these on their feed or Stories or send them to others via direct messages.

The capacity to create AI content using someone else’s likeness is an intriguing feature of the tool, as the tipster described in a different screenshot. However, a user would need to have their consent before they could do so. The option to invite another person is displayed in the screenshot. This would probably send the other user a direct message or other similar notification, and they would need to accept before their image could be used to produce AI-generated material.

Most likely, the permission-based structure was implemented to prevent users’ likenesses from being exploited or utilised in ways they do not approve of. In order to address this, OpenAI’s Sora allows users to block particular phrases and actions that are impossible for anyone to produce, even if they have access to their image. How Instagram will handle this is unknown.

We advise being cautious until Instagram makes an announcement because the company has not yet formally confirmed this development.

The following are important details about the reported feature:

• Personalised Generations: By responding to straightforward text questions, users could create unique images of themselves in a variety of situations.
• Permission-Based System: The tool may ask users to send a request via Direct Message (DM) to others to use their likeness in order to prevent misuse and deepfake concerns. The recipient must then consent before the AI may create content that features them.
• Likeness Information: It is hypothesised that Instagram may create these digital models by looking at a user’s past Highlights and posts or by requiring a specific selfie to be activated.
• Integration: Alessandro Paluzzi, a social media expert, noticed the functionality in progress and speculated that it would eventually be shared through Stories, direct messages, or standard feed postings.

This action is part of Meta’s larger plan to incorporate Movie Gen AI models into its platforms, which will allow users to alter almost any element of their videos using text commands, including backgrounds and costumes.