Snapchat Unveils New AI Bot for All 750 Million of Its Users

A social media app known for disappearing messages and pictures is now offering an artificial intelligence bot for its users.

Snap, the parent company of the app Snapchat, which boasts 750 million users worldwide, announced the move mere months after the OpenAI-powered bot was first introduced to the app's paid subscribers, according to The Verge.

The bot, which goes by "My AI" unless you change its name in the app, responds to questions and comments you send it through the app's messaging service. However, it does appear impossible to delete the AI from your chat.

Credit: Joe Cunningham/KPEL

But My AI is more than just a chatbot. It has multiple functions tied directly to the other services the app offers.

Users can add the AI to group chats by mentioning it with an @ symbol, and they can also change the look and name of their bot with a custom Bitmoji avatar.

As far as sending snaps (the photos and videos that can be sent between users on the app) go, My AI can now recommend AR filters to use in Snapchat’s camera or places to visit from the app’s map tab.

Snap is also planning let people visually message My AI and receive generated responses in the near future. According to The Verge, the company showed an example of the service during their annual conference earlier this week, in which the bot was sent a photo fo a tomato garden and it responded with a generated image of gazpacho soup.

AI and Privacy Concerns

However, there are some privacy concerns with the app's AI. Fortune is reporting that while the AI tells users it doesn't know their location, it in fact does. Those privacy concerns have led some to come up with guides meant to remove the bot from users' accounts.

Snap has portrayed itself as a company focused on privacy, hence the instantly-disappearing photos, videos, and messages that the platform was built on. However, all of those things can now be saved in the chat and even on people's phones. An AI bot now being introduced complicates just how much of one's personal information can actually be gathered.

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Source: Snapchat Unveils New AI Bot for All 750 Million of Its Users, but Some Have Privacy Concerns

Filed Under: social media, snapchat, artificial intelligence