A new wave of digital creators has been flooding social media feeds, sporting dark skin tones and catering to specific racial tropes.
However, the discovery that these “influencers” are actually AI-generated caricatures has sparked a massive outcry over the modern-day exploitation of Black bodies.
TikTok has banned several accounts that used AI-generated Black female influencers to direct social media users to sexually explicit content on other websites.
According to The BBC, dozens of accounts on Instagram and TikTok were found to have violated the platforms’ policies by promoting highly sexualized Black avatars generated by AI without tagging the content as AI-generated.
Most of the accounts were on Instagram, and a third of those pages also ran profiles on TikTok with the same digital characters.
Several of the avatars had dark skin tones, and their page names included the terms “black,” “noir,” “dark” and “ebony.” The profiles would also post comments such as “loves white men” and “why I need a white guy in my life.”
Analysts found roughly 60 accounts that promoted links to third-party websites with sexually explicit AI-generated paid content.
One of the pages even edited videos of a Malaysian model and content creator, overlaid an AI-generated Black woman’s face onto the model’s body, and made the avatar simulate the model’s movements.
“I believe these accounts are racist because their existence perpetuates a long history of the exploitation of black people,” said Angel Nulani, one of the researchers who discovered the pages. “Their use of caricatures, race-play terminology and unrealistic depictions of black women prove they’re not concerned with our safety or wellbeing, but our ability to be capitalised as part of the online porn machine.”
The BBC’s investigation resulted in the deletion of 20 TikTok accounts.
“TikTok prohibits AI generated content of individuals used without their permission, we have zero tolerance for content which promotes off-platform sexual services,” a TikTok spokesperson told the outlet.
In the last year, racist AI-generated content has come under fire and raised concerns about how closely monitored and moderated AI-driven accounts are on social platforms.
Back in November, several AI-generated videos showing Black women complaining about the cutoff of their EBT benefits during a government shutdown went viral and drew backlash about the harmful stereotypes they perpetuate.
