Meta Patents AI That Can Simulate Deceased Users on Social Media, Raising Digital Afterlife Concerns
By
Mike Bennett, Nicole Bennett
Fresh out the oven, still warm. Top of the tray.
Summary
Meta has been granted a patent (US Patent No. 12,513,102) for an AI system that can simulate a deceased social media user by monitoring their feed, training a language model on their past activity, and generating predicted interactions like likes and comments. The article argues that as digital afterlives become governed by private tech infrastructure, individual planning (like wills or account settings) will be insufficient to protect user autonomy and dignity after death. The authors, Mike Bennett and Nicole Bennett, raise concerns about consent, privacy, and the power tech companies hold over our digital identities beyond the grave.
Key quotes
· 3 pulledIn other words, the company has patented a mechanism that could keep your account expressing 'you' even after you no longer exist to consent.
If digital afterlives are governed by private infrastructure, individual planning will never be enough.
The patent describes a bot that monitors content in a user's feed, prompts a language model trained on that user's prior activity, and then generates predicted interactions in the user's name.
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