What are your rights when using the Lensa AI app?

If you've been scrolling on social media as of late, you may have noticed many people on your feed sharing creative and colourful AI illustrations of themselves.

And that's all thanks to Lensa.

Created by Prisma Labs, it provides a feature that allows people to develop "Magic Avatars" of themselves.

Although having an AI version of yourself is fantastic, other questions arise, such as what are your rights as a user of the app and the kind of data it collects.

Lensa, which has been around since 2018, is available in both Google Play and the iOS app store.

The company's website describes the app as an "all-in-one" destination and "takes photos to the next level."

This is done with features such as Magic Correction to "help improve facial retouching" and other interesting tools that can "perfect the facial imperfections."

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However, the avatars aren't achieved just by using filters. The filter also needs 10 to 20 photos of yourself.

"This is not a filter or an effect. These AI avatars are generated from scratch but with your face in mind. Upload 10-20 pictures, give it a few minutes, and get hundreds of artworks created by #artificialintelligence for you!" Prisma said in an Instagram post in November.

The app is free to download and provides a trial. But it will charge you $3.99 for a total of 50 images.

In terms of the data that the app collects, both the parent company Prisma and Lensa, have faced some backlash due to the company's privacy policy.

It states that the photos created won't be used by the company, but they would hold onto personal data for an undisclosed timeframe not mentioned in the policy.

In another part of the privacy policy, the tech company does state that they may not "accommodate a request to change information" if they have a reason to think that it would "cause the information to be incorrect" or be in violation of the law."

Still, people can email privacy@prisma-ai.com to request "deletion," "modification," or "correction" of their personal data provided to the company.

As for the company's terms and conditions, which are different from the privacy policy, Prisma/Lensa explains that people can retain "your rights" in "and to your user content." Still, it ultimately puts in a "Company License."

The Company License would help with "developing and improving our existing and new products."

According to the website, as a consumer, you are giving the company the right to this information.

Many people online claim that the pieces remove the artists' signatures or blatantly steal their work. And many of the artists are marginalised individuals.

"These are all Lensa portraits where the mangled remains of an artist's signature is still visible. That's the remains of the signature of one of the multiple artists it stole from," wrote graphic designer and artist Lauryn Ipsum on Twitter.

With Lensa's popularity and virality, it's still worth keeping the pros and cons in mind.

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