Instagram’s ‘Powered by AI’ Label Changed to ‘AI Disclosure’ After Photographer Complaints

On Monday, Meta announced that it was “updating the ‘Made with AI’ label to ‘AI info’ in our apps, which people can click on for more information,” after people complained that their photos had the tag incorrectly applied. Former White House photographer Pete Souza pointed out the tag appeared when uploading a photo originally taken on video at a basketball game 40 years ago, speculating that using Adobe’s cropping and image-flattening tool may have triggered it.

“As we’ve said from the beginning, we’re constantly improving our AI products and working closely with our industry partners on our approach to AI labeling,” said Meta spokeswoman Kate McLaughlin. The fresh label is meant to more accurately represent that content can simply be modified, rather than appearing to be entirely generated by AI.

The issue appears to be with metadata tools like Adobe Photoshop that relate to images and how platforms interpret that. After Meta expanded its AI content labeling policy, real-life photos posted to platforms like Instagram, Facebook, and Threads were labeled “Made with AI.”

McLaughlin says you can see the fresh labels first in the mobile apps and only then in the web view. Edge begins to spread to all surfaces.

When you click on the tag, it will still show the same message as the venerable label, which includes a more detailed explanation of why it may have been applied and that it may include images that were fully AI-generated or edited with tools that include AI technology, such as Generative Fill. Metadata tagging technology like C2PA was supposed to make it simpler and easier to distinguish between AI-generated and real-world images, but that future is not yet here.