How come "Ants, Hey" became unpopular in just 7 days with 7.85 million users and 2.7 billion views? Netizens: Most likely it's because...

Author | Liu Lin

"Ants, hey, ants, huh, ants, ha ha..."

In recent days, the entire Internet has been surrounded by this magical BGM.

How popular is it?

Open any social software and you may be brainwashed by this magical music. Even your aunts and uncles who don’t usually go online will ask you how you did it.

The effect couldn't be more magical.

Netizens also said that it was as if they had entered an ant nest.

Looking at the data from TikTok alone, as of press time, the related topic has been played 2.78 billion times, and the special effects have been used by 7.85 million people, which shows how popular it is. The behind-the-scenes app Avatarify also ranks first in the Chinese App Store overall ranking.

In addition, the butterfly effect of "Ants, Hey" not only created Avatarify's dominance on the charts, but also boosted the two apps Jianying and Tencent Accelerator.

However, this face-changing software failed after only 7 days on the market.

On March 2, Avatarify was quietly removed from the shelves in the early morning. The official did not explain the reason.

According to previous reports by Leifeng.com, this software was created by a Russian programmer named Ali Aliev.

Due to the special working methods during the epidemic, working from home is a bit boring, so this guy wanted to play a prank on his colleagues, and this AI face-changing software came out.

Initially, what this software can do is disguise your face as any face you want, such as Musk.

What he didn't expect was that after he posted the project on GitHub, it immediately became popular among foreign netizens. It ranked first on GitHub's daily list just ten days after it was online.

However, for domestic users, the face-changing software Avatarify is still relatively unfamiliar. After all, if you want to change your face, users need to have a certain foundation in machine learning before they can set it up on their computer.

Therefore, Ali Aliev made Avatarify into an App, and the zero-threshold operation made this magical software instantly top the iOS photography and video rankings.

Users only need to upload a photo, and the people, animals, and cartoon characters in the photo can twist their necks and sing "Ants" with you.

Thanks to this spoof gameplay, it has topped the App Store's free app list in China since February 25, and has remained at the top of the overall list for several consecutive days.

In addition, many celebrities have followed suit, pushing Avatarify to new heights.

But in the final analysis, the main reason why this kind of AI special effect can be so popular and even "break the circle" and make everyone have a lot of fun is convenience - it can be completed without any programming knowledge.

But past experience with similar products tells us that there are always various problems behind this type of AI face-changing software.

In just 7 days, Avatarify, the product behind the AI ​​special effects of Ant Ya Hey, was quickly removed from the shelves (only in China, it is still available on overseas websites).

Although the official has not made a positive response, some netizens said that this is most likely because it involves personal privacy issues.

Of course, such concerns are not groundless.

After all, AI face-changing software has been controversial since its appearance.

Let’s look at a few examples.

In December 2017, a user named "Deepfakes" posted his own AI face-changing video on the Internet for the first time, grafting the face of Hollywood star Gal Gadot onto another face, which sparked a lot of discussion and criticism. He then directly open-sourced the project code, and more imitators followed, using "Deepfake" to refer to AI face-changing technology.

In January 2018, an app that can realize "one-click face change" was launched, and US President Trump was spoofed.

In February 2019, a face-swapping video of "Athena Chu turning into Yang Mi" went viral on the Internet. After the video caused controversy, the video maker immediately removed the video.

In June 2019, an app that claimed to be able to undress with one click was criticized as "one of the worst applications of AI technology" because the risks were beyond control and it was removed from the shelves a few days after it went online.

Coincidentally, at the end of August 2019, ZAO was launched in China. In just two days, it became one of the most popular apps in the Apple App Store. ZAO's slogan is concise and clear, "Only one photo is needed", "Star in the best plays in the world", "Add friends to co-star". The emergence of ZAO satisfies people's desire to hunt for novelties and participate in blockbuster movies.

Like Avatarify, ZAO also occupied the App Store free list for a short period of time. However, ZAO was interviewed by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology just after it became popular, and the App was removed from the App Store and banned in just about 3 days.

In a poll initiated by Sina Technology asking "Would you try AI face-changing?", 83 out of 142 participants chose "No, privacy cannot be guaranteed."

It can be seen that security issues have always been the core topic surrounding facial recognition technology. Although countless companies have emphasized the security of this technology, and facial recognition has really provided a lot of convenience in many scenarios, doubts have not been dispelled from the minds of users.

After all, when face-changing technology first emerged, it sparked heated discussions around the world. Although face-changing apps sparked a period of popularity, they also exacerbated people's fear of facial recognition - there is no sense of incongruity after the face is changed, so can't it be used for fraud?

Under pressure from public opinion, some face-changing apps have been removed from the shelves, but the impact has already been formed.

The open source of DeepFake has lowered the technical threshold for AI face-changing, but the corresponding black industry has also grown rapidly. Various erotic face-changing videos and software tutorials have emerged in an endless stream. In China, an upstream industry has been formed that provides software and technology, the midstream provides videos and photo customization, and the downstream sells finished videos. Some businesses even do business in the entire industry chain.

According to a survey by a cybersecurity company, in the past few years, cybercriminals have used ransomware to make money, and now they are targeting AI face-changing technology. They carry out criminal activities by forging videos and voice messages from senior corporate executives, asking corporate financial personnel to transfer funds, or forging photos of core team leaders.

There are many examples of deepfake videos and pictures on the dark web, where cybercriminals sell Deepfake technology at super low prices, with deepfake videos starting at $5, fake static pictures at $2.5 each, and Deepfake software starting at $25.

More and more people are beginning to resist AI face-swapping. The risk is that synthetic photos and videos that have been AI-swapped are not recognizable to the naked eye, and some cannot even be identified by a single technical model, so they can easily be re-circulated as real information. In addition to DeepFake, the most commonly used AI face-swapping algorithms are FaceSwap and Face2Face, and the results generated by different algorithms vary greatly.

Copyright, privacy, legal risks... these all limit the growth of AI face-changing games.

The fact that the popular app Ant Ya Hey was quickly removed from the shelves after only 7 days also sparked heated discussions among netizens.

Some netizens believe that as long as it does not involve privacy issues, this type of software can still exist. After all, if this software is removed from the shelves, another source of happiness for workers will be gone. (Manual dog head)

However, the vast majority of netizens believe that as far as the current technology of AI face-changing software is concerned, there is no problem with the technology itself, but there are too many hidden dangers, and users are really unable to cope with it. It is normal for it to be short-lived.

Of course, some netizens have analyzed the reasons why AI face-changing products are short-lived in the domestic market based on their characteristics:

The functions provided by this type of app are not what users urgently need, and user stickiness is low, so it is easily abandoned by users and eventually becomes a "monthly throwaway" software.

Of course, from a deeper perspective, the demise of Ant YaHey may not be a bad thing. It just shows that we have maintained a positive attitude towards personal privacy.

After all, "face" is special personal privacy information, and its data security deserves everyone's attention.

References for this article:

• https://www.huxiu.com/article/411886.html

• https://www.huxiu.com/article/412558.html

• https://finance.sina.com.cn/tech/2021-03-03/doc-ikftpnnz1038820.shtml

• https://www.leiphone.com/news/202102/k9x4COS3jDYa84eF.html

• https://www.toutiao.com/a6934979258343293470/

This article is originally written by Leifeng.com, author : Liu Lin . Please reply "reprint" to apply for authorization. Reprinting without authorization is prohibited .