Protecting Trust in Historical Images from the Coalition for Responsible AI in Genealogy

 https://craigen.org/protecting-trust-in-historical-images/

Let's say you are now on FamilySearch.org looking at your part of the FamilyTree and discover that someone has posted a Memory of a "photo" of your great-great-great grandmother who died in 1834. You begin to wonder where this image came from. Obviously, with the now not-so-new availability almost anyone can ask for generated images from dozens, perhaps hundreds, of online apps including such well-known apps such as Photoshop, ChatGPT, and many others. 

Here is a sample image generated from Adobe Firefly.

I should hope my ancestors were rich enough to look like this. Anyway, it might help to note that photography, especially color photography, did not exist in the 1700s. However, anyone can totally disreagard historical accuracy and generate almost anything you can imagine. Because of what is happening in the AI world of image and video generation, the Coalition for Responsible AI in Genealogy (CRAIGEN.org) has been working on establishing some basic principles for using generated images and for using AI in general. If you are a genealogist and have any idea of the historical problems arising from the improper use of AI not only to generate images but also to alter historical images, documents and artifacts, you should click on the link to the website and review the Guiding Principles and Statements. You might also want to read some of the Education articles. We will be posting more information and articles as well as writing blog posts and doing videos on thes subjects raised on the website.