How to Protect Yourself from AI Art Theft
The rapid advancements in artificial intelligence (AI) have revolutionized the way people can create and appreciate art. With just a few taps on our smartphones, someone can transform ordinary photographs into stunning artistic renderings, mimicking various styles and themes. However, this newfound creative technology comes at a cost: the theft of original artwork by AI algorithms. As AI applications absorb vast amounts of data, including original artwork, artists find their creations and trademark styles are being used without their consent. To combat this issue, the University of Chicago is developing Glaze, a groundbreaking computer program designed to protect artists’ originality in the face of AI art theft.
The Challenge of AI Art Theft
Free AI-powered apps have made it effortless for anyone to generate digital artwork within seconds. While AI generated art can be a very useful tool for artists to use for inspiration or to generate trademark free stock images, many AI algorithms currently operate under morally dubious circumstances.
Many apps often extract and store original, copyrighted artwork to feed their algorithms and generate new images, therefore profiting off of stolen work. And this threat is not limited to just fine artists, more and more AI programs are offering renderings and AI generated concept art of 3D objects which are often generated from databases of online images of artisans’ works. These images could be sourced from anywhere, from large scale artisan markets, like Etsy, to your personal online store.
Whether we like it or not AI generated art is here to stay and the theft of artists’ original creations poses a significant problem for the artistic community. To combat this threat, we need innovative solutions.
Enter Glaze: Protecting Original Artwork
Glaze is one such solution. Developed by the SAND Lab at the University of Chicago, Glaze is a cutting-edge computer program designed to provide artists with a means to safeguard their unique styles from AI art mimicry. Its primary goal is to make original artwork incomprehensible to AI algorithms while still retaining its aesthetic appeal to human observers.
How Glaze Works
Glaze operates by generating a cloaked version of each artwork, allowing artists to shield their creations from AI art generators. While preserving the visual integrity of the artwork for human viewers, Glaze introduces subtle modifications that render the original image illegible to AI systems. By applying subtle changes to key style elements like brushstrokes, palette, texture, and shadowing, Glaze effectively conceals the defining characteristics of the artist’s style from AI generators. This protective measure is implemented solely on the artist’s computer, ensuring complete control over the creative work and guaranteeing the privacy of the original artwork. Artists can confidently share their cloaked versions online, knowing that their unique style remains shielded from AI mimicry.
Advantages and Future Prospects
Glaze offers numerous advantages to artists seeking to protect their originality. By using the program, artists regain control over their work and prevent AI models from plagiarizing their unique styles. Glaze’s protection against AI mimicry means that even if an AI model has learned from an artist’s previously published work, it will struggle to accurately reproduce their style in future forgeries.
The team behind Glaze has collaborated closely with artists throughout the development process, soliciting feedback and incorporating their concerns. This partnership has ensured that Glaze aligns with artists’ needs and safeguards their creative expression. Through this process, the researchers have aimed to create a user-friendly downloadable version that artists can use on their personal computers, empowering them to protect their artwork swiftly and efficiently.
Glaze’s Limitations
While Glaze is a great tool, it is not a foolproof solution against AI mimicry. The rapidly evolving nature of AI technology presents an ongoing challenge. Techniques employed by early versions of Glaze may face potential countermeasures in the future, leaving previously protected art vulnerable. However, Glaze serves as a crucial first step toward artist-centric protection tools, offering artists a means to resist AI mimicry while legal and regulatory efforts catch up.
The Glaze research team have also noted some limitations of the app. For instance, it may not work as well on flat colors or smooth backgrounds as are common in many animation and minimalistic graphic styles. The program can still cloak these images but the changes caused by cloaking may be more visible to the human eye than in artwork with complex brushstrokes and texture.
Despite the inherent risks, Glaze has been designed with robustness in mind. Extensive testing against known systems and countermeasures has ensured its effectiveness in the current digital landscape. To the best of our knowledge, Glaze is currently the only available tool for artists to proactively protect their style while sharing their art online. The research team behind Glaze is committed to continuously improving and updating the tool, staying at the forefront of the battle against AI mimicry.
How to Get Glaze
As Glaze continues to be developed and improved, the first version, Glaze GPU, has been released for Windows and is now free for any artist to download to their devices. Due to the nature of the project, the Glaze team has announced that they have not and will not commercialize Glaze in any way. They have worked hand in hand with teams of fine artists to develop this tool and have now released it for free, purely with the goal of protecting artists. If you have a Windows device, all you have to do is simply go to the website and download the app to your computer.
Where This Leaves Us
Not everyone will want to go through the trouble of cloaking every image or their art that they post online. But in the current digital landscape, artists must be aware that every time they do so, they are facing the possibility that AI algorithms will steal and use their art, and that the work that AI creates from that stolen artwork cannot be copyrighted as the laws currently stand. For some, that may be a reasonable risk. But for many, protective action through programs like Glaze are the next step in protecting their artistic brand.
It is even more important for businesses who host other artists’ work, such as digital marketplaces and artisan-based social media (think Etsy, Pinterest, and, yes, us at Handmade Seller), to protect that work from these predatory algorithms. At Handmade Seller at least, we are planning to begin using image cloaking programs to safeguard that artwork that our featured artists share with us.
As AI continues to revolutionize the art world, it is crucial for artists to guard themselves from the consequences of its advancements. Glaze offers a powerful tool to do so. By safeguarding artists’ originality and unique styles, Glaze ensures that creativity thrives in an AI-dominated landscape. With Glaze as their ally, artists can confidently share their work, knowing that their creative integrity remains intact in the face of AI mimicry.
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