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SUZY LEONARD

Suzy Fleming Leonard: No FaceApp needed; I'm aging just fine on my own

While scrolling through Facebook the other day, I came across the photo of a friend's little sister.

I met her once in person 30-plus years ago when she was still in middle school. For the past 10 years, I've followed her adventures virtually, a cute kid grown to be an accomplished woman.

In this particular pic, she was looking up at the camera, impish grin on her face, blue eyes sparkling, not unlike dozens of other photos she posts. 

FaceApp is under fire for privacy concerns.

Except this one gave me pause. I know a lot of time has passed, but dang, she's at least a decade younger than I am. When did she start looking so old?

D'oh! I was fooled by FaceApp. 

It wasn't long before FaceApp portraits starting flooding my social media feeds: a cousin and her husband looking a lot like our grandparents; a former colleague standing on the beach, his face shriveled like a raisin; four photos of Hermione Granger from "Harry Potter," one with a slight smile (the original), one with a full smile, one as Herman Granger and one as Grandma Granger.

My cousin, Emily Maddox, and her husband Scott are in their 30s, but not according to FaceApp.

Turns out you can do a lot more than just age yourself with FaceApp technology. Like surrender yourself to the Russians.

Not long after all these fun, funny photos started showing up, so did the tales of caution.

More:FaceApp: Concerns raised that viral app making you old is a Russian company taking your selfies

"While according to FaceApp's terms of service people still own their own 'user content' (read: face), the company owns a never-ending and irrevocable royalty-free license to do anything they want with it," John Koetsier wrote on forbes.com.

The Russian-made app, which uses artificial intelligence to manipulate photos, is hanging out at the top of the charts at the Apple and Google stores, but technology writers from The Washington Post, USA Today, the New York Times and Popular Science weighed in with warnings.

"Looking under the hood of FaceApp with the tools from my iPhone test, I found it sharing information about my phone with Facebook and Google AdMob, which probably help it place ads and check the performance of its ads," wrote Washington Post technology columnist Geoffrey A. Fowler.

"The most unsettling part was how much data FaceApp was sending to its own servers, after which … who knows what happens. It’s not just your own face that FaceApp might gobble up — if you age friends or family members, their face gets uploaded, too."

So the question is, if you take a peek into the future and check out what you could look like in 30 or 40 years, will all your information be leaked to Russian spies? 

Probably not, but you never know.

At least this is one cyber threat that doesn't concern me. I decided not to download the app way before I learned of its nefarious possibilities. 

I don't need an app or artificial intelligence to show my face looking older than it should be.

I've got a mirror for that.

Email sleonard@floridatoday.com

Instagram: @SuzyLeonard

Facebook: @SuzyFlemingLeonard

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