It seems the internet is getting more and more alien to us mere mortals. While a few years ago, social media was littered with cringe-but-harmless Minion memes, it is now a wasteland of bizarre AI imagery that’s duping quite a lot of people.
A study published late last year by the University of Waterloo saw 260 participants provided with 20 unlabelled pictures: 10 of which were of real people obtained from Google searches, and the other 10 generated by two commonly used AI programs that generate images.
Participants were asked to identify which images were real and which were AI-generated.
Researchers expected that around 85% of participants would be able to tell the difference between the real and the AI generated images, but it was actually only 61% of participants that were able to.
“People are not as adept at making the distinction as they think they are.” said Andreea Pocol, a PhD candidate in Computer Science at the University of Waterloo and the study’s lead author.
How to tell if an image is AI-generated
Part of the key to recognising AI images is not just taking them in as part of your mindless scroll.
There is still a certain unrealness to AI images, they look a little too polished. According to the BBC, hands are often a good identifier as AI image generators still haven’t figured out how to make them.
Additionally, if there is text or logos within the image, have a quick zoom at what they actually say. The BBC said: “This is a tell-tale sign of AI images, as they often get small details like text or logos wrong.”
The BBC added: “Another giveaway that an image might be AI is the location. AI images are quite often set in a perfect location or fantasy world.”
Finally, if you’re still not 100% sure, you can do a reverse image search on Google by uploading the image to the Google app and seeing if any similar ones appear. Generally, there are fewer AI images than real ones and it could take you to the source of the image which is likely an AI image generator website.