Beauty app FaceApp apologises over ‘racist’ filter accusations

There are plenty of beauty apps doing the rounds, but one that has caught particular attention lately, and for all the wrong reasons, is FaceApp. 

The app was accused of racism thanks to the lightening effects of one of the filters.

The creator apologised after before and after snaps of people using the app caused outrage amongst users due to the skin tone change. 

So this app is apparently racist as hell. But at least I'm sassy. #faceapp https://t.co/I0L4yWWXaV pic.twitter.com/v1ME8H8seP

— kung fu khary (@kharyrandolph) April 18, 2017

FaceApp transforms selfies by making people look older or younger, and can even change the users gender.

The filter labelled 'hot' is the issue, as images show the dramatic difference in skin tone applied by the filter.

'We are deeply sorry for this unquestionably serious issue,'Yaroslav Goncharov, CEO and founder of the company told Cosmopolitan.

'It is an unfortunate side-effect of the underlying neural network caused by the training set bias, not intended behaviour.'

So I downloaded this app and decided to pick the "hot" filter not knowing that it would make me white. It's 2017, c'mon guys smh#FaceApp pic.twitter.com/9U9dv9JuCm

— Shahquelle L. (@RealMoseby96) April 20, 2017

Naturally, people still aren't happy with the results of the filter, which has since been renamed 'spark.'

'PSA: Stop downloading and using this racist app,' tweeted one offended Twitter user.