The edited Princess Kate photo probably wasn't made with AI

An official photo of the Princess of Wales, Kate Middleton, and her children released Sunday was likely just crudely manipulated with a program like Photoshop.

Despite speculation that it was generated with artificial intelligence, an official photo of the Princess of Wales, Kate Middleton, and her three children released Sunday was likely just manipulated with a program like Photoshop, experts told NBC News.

Though there was no indicator of generative AI visible in the photo, the speculation shows how quickly AI has captured the public’s imagination and become integrated with online conspiracy theories.

In tabloid headlines, viral tweets and widely read Reddit posts, online watchers of the unfolding tumult over Middleton’s public appearances quipped that the image “looks like AI.” A post on X that’s been viewed more than 4 million times called the photo an “AI doctored image.”

But that’s most likely not correct.

“I think it is unlikely that this is anything more than a relatively minor photo manipulation,” Hany Farid, a University of California, Berkeley, professor who investigates digital manipulation and misinformation, told NBC News. “There is no evidence that this image is entirely AI-generated,” he said.

https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/internet/kate-middleton-photo-ai-image-photoshop-edit-rcna142799

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