It’s a “fake PR stunt”: Artists hate Meta’s AI data deletion process

Artists who have tried to use Meta’s data deletion request form have learned this the hard way and have been deeply frustrated with the process. “It was horrible,” illustrator Mignon Zakuga says. Over a dozen artists shared with WIRED an identical form letter they received from Meta in response to their queries. In it, Meta says it is “unable to process the request” until the requester submits evidence that their personal information appears in responses from Meta’s generative AI.

Mihaela Voicu, a Romanian digital artist and photographer who has tried to request data deletion twice using Meta’s form, says the process feels like “a bad joke.” She’s received the “unable to process request” boilerplate language, too. “It’s not actually intended to help people,” she believes.

Bethany Berg, a Colorado-based conceptual artist, has received the “unable to process request” response to numerous attempts to delete her data. “I started to feel like it was just a fake PR stunt to make it look like they were actually trying to do something,” she says.