“十年挑战”风靡社交媒体  是风潮还是陷阱？ Is Facebook's '10-Year Challenge' meme a creepy facial recognition gambit?

还记得年少时的自己吗？最近，社交媒体上掀起了一股“10年挑战”热潮。不管是明星还是普通人，都纷纷晒出了自己现在的照片和10年前的照片，感慨岁月的匆匆。然而也有技术专家指出，这其实是社交网站收集用户信息，用来改进面部识别功能的一个陷阱。

In recent years social media has been dominated by viral challenges that have seen people take part in a range of outlandish tasks, from ingesting teaspoons of spicy cinnamon to pouring sub-zero buckets of ice over their heads.

近些年，社交媒体总是被一些迅速风靡的挑战热潮淹没，网友们纷纷加入一些稀奇古怪的挑战大军，比如吞下一勺辣肉桂，或者往头上浇一桶冰水等等。

outlandish [aʊt'lændɪʃ]：adj.古怪的；奇异的

Now though, there’s a new viral sensation that’s sweeping across everyone’s Twitter and Instagram : the "10 Year Challenge," where users upload side-by-side photos of themselves from a decade ago and now.

而今，一种新的挑战再度席卷推特和Ins等社交媒体，那就是“10年挑战”。用户们上传自己10年前和现在的照片进行对比。

什么是“10年挑战”？

If you use social media, you’ve probably noticed a number of people posting then-and-now profile pictures. It’s a trend that’s best known as the 10 Year Challenge.

如果你使用社交媒体，你会注意到很多人正在网上上传自己10年前和现在的照片。这就是人们所说的“10年挑战”风潮。

The craze involves people comparing pictures of themselves in 2009 to ones taken in 2019 on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

人们在脸书、推特和Ins等社交媒体上对比自己10年前和今年的照片。

风潮的缘起？

As with most social media challenges, it is a little unclear as to who or what started the movement.

跟社交媒体上兴起的大多数挑战一样，这项挑战到底是哪个人还是哪个机构发起，尚不清楚。

While some suggest it has something to do with Facebook’s "Memories" feature that reminds you of long-forgotten photos, others suspect it is because 2009 was the year that social media really took off.

一些人认为这和脸书的“记忆”功能有关，这一功能会提醒你查看已经被遗忘很久的照片。还有些人认为，这是挑战缘起是因为2009年是社交媒体真正开始流行的元年。

众明星纷纷加入“10年挑战”

The viral movement has proved popular among A-listers with everyone from Reese Witherspoon and Miley Cyrus to Tyra Banks and Jessica Biel taking part.

这项迅速风靡的挑战在大牌明星中也很受欢迎，瑞妮-威瑟斯彭、麦莉-塞勒斯、泰拉-班克斯、杰西卡-贝尔等人都加入进来。

A-lister：一线明星

岁月似乎在很多人身上并没有留下太多痕迹，比如美国著名歌手麦当娜：

美国著名脱口秀《艾伦秀》的主持人Ellen称，她发现自己手的姿势就没变过。

国内一些明星也纷纷加入挑战：

还有某球队晒出荣誉柜的10年，调侃自己：

一些网友还晒出照片，呼吁大家关注气候变化：

是风潮还是陷阱？

有科技界人士质疑，脸书发起这项活动是为了收集用户的面部信息，用来训练面部识别算法。

Suspicions were raised this week that the 10-year challenge is part of a Facebook campaign to upgrade its facial recognition robots.

本周，有人怀疑这一挑战是脸书推出的一个的活动，以升级其面部识别机器人。

Facebook has denied it’s using a viral social media challenge to harvest data about your face.

脸书公司否认使用这一挑战活动来获取用户的面部数据信息。

But the scandal-hit firm has hit back at the claims, insisting the meme is simply “evidence of the fun people have on Facebook.”

但这家最近丑闻缠身的公司对此予以回击，坚称这一活动仅仅是“人们在脸书得到快乐的证明”。

Wired journalist Kate O’Neill wrote that it was “plausible” Facebook could be using the pictures to train its photo-scanning algorithms.

《连线》杂志记者凯特-奥尼尔写道，脸书公司“很可能”使用这些照片来训练其图片扫描算法。

对此，脸书发言人表示，“10年挑战”是在用户间出现的风潮，而且用户可自行决定是否开启面容识别功能，而且这些10年前的照片早已上传到脸书。

O’Neill said that while many of the photos used for 10-year posts are already on the internet, the meme would help Facebook’s all-knowing AI to grow because unsuspecting users label their snaps with specific dates and locations.

但奥尼尔说，尽管很多10年前的照片早已上传到网络，这还是可以帮助脸书无所不知的人工智能系统进一步发展，因为一些并没有起疑的用户在照片上标注了拍摄时间和地点。

“Imagine that you wanted to train a facial recognition algorithm on age-related characteristics and, more specifically, on age progression (eg, how people are likely to look as they get older),” she wrote.

奥尼尔写道：“假设你想要训练面部识别算法与年龄有关的特性，更准确地说，是面容随年龄变化的特性（比如，随着人们年龄的增大，面容会怎样改变）。”

“Ideally, you’d want a broad and rigorous dataset with lots of people’s pictures.

“理想情况下，你会想要一个广泛且严谨的照片数据集。”

“It would help if you knew they were taken a fixed number of years apart—say, 10 years.”

“如果你知道这些照片拍摄的间隔都是10年的话，会很有帮助。”

Facebook lashed back at O’Neill, insisting it was not behind the challenge.

脸书回应了奥尼尔的评论，坚称自己并不是发起者。

“The 10-year challenge is a user-generated meme that started on its own, without our involvement,” it wrote on Twitter.

脸书公司在官方推特上表示：“‘10年挑战’是用户发起的活动，是自发的，我们没有参与。”

In a separate comment, Facebook said it “gains nothing from this meme” and reminded users they can turn off facial recognition at any time.

在另一条评论中，脸书表示自己“并未从这次活动中获取什么”，并提醒用户可以随时关闭面部识别功能。

英文来源：独立报、纽约邮报

翻译&编辑：yaning