{"id":26313,"date":"2026-03-03T10:59:18","date_gmt":"2026-03-03T10:59:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/?p=26313"},"modified":"2026-03-03T10:59:18","modified_gmt":"2026-03-03T10:59:18","slug":"want-to-live-forever-meta-patented-an-ai-model-that-would-keep-your-profile-active-after-you-die","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/?p=26313","title":{"rendered":"Want to live forever? Meta patented an AI model that would keep your profile active after you die"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Meta was recently granted a patent in Dec, 2025 that would essentially allow the social media platform to post on a dormant user\u2019s behalf\u2014whether they took a break from social media or long after they\u2019ve passed away. The patent, first filed in 2023, describes a large language model that \u201csimulates\u201d a user\u2019s social media activity, using a user\u2019s comments, likes, or content to respond to other users and also references technology that would simulate video or audio calls with users.<\/p>\n

Using AI to revive the dead, through text, speech, or video is nothing new, but the technology described in the patent has the added dynamic of using a deceased user\u2019s existing account chock full of posts and photos among other content to continue to interact with other users, ultimately driving engagement on Meta\u2019s platforms. Meta\u2019s Chief Technology Officer Andrew Bosworth noted in the patent that account inactivity (say that of a deceased person\u2019s) can affect other users\u2019 experiences, and the impact of inactivity is \u201cmuch more severe and permanent\u201d when a user is deceased, he wrote. Experts say this rationale is a new way of justifying bringing users\u2019 content back to life.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s a really interesting shift because that suggests that user death is like an engagement problem.\u201d Elaine Kasket, a cyberpsychologist, told Fortune<\/em>, describing how she interpreted the patent. She has studied digital afterlives for 21 years\u2014long before social media or AI became a part of everyday life\u2014and what happens to our data after we\u2019re gone.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have no plans to move forward with this example,\u201d a Meta spokesperson told Fortune <\/em>in a statement. While a patent does not mean the company is actively pursuing the technology, Meta and the patent\u2019s primary author, Bosworth, will continue to explore applications for large language models, the spokesperson wrote.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Currently, Facebook and Instagram allow users to remove or \u201cmemorialize\u201d their loved ones\u2019 accounts, which designates the profile of a deceased user with the \u201cRemembering\u201d label and blocks anyone from logging in.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Interrupting grief<\/strong><\/p>\n

Meta is not the first Big Tech company to patent a model to keep the formerly alive still kicking online. Well before the AI era began, Microsoft filed a patent in 2017 for a method to create a chatbot based on a person\u2019s \u201csocial data,\u201d including images, social media posts, messages, voice data and written letters.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Microsoft\u2019s Tim O\u2019Brien, who previously managed the company\u2019s AI programs, called the technology \u201cdisturbing\u201d after the company announced they had no plans to develop the technology.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In the years since Microsoft was granted the patent, products offering to recreate the likeness of the dead have shifted from a novelty to services people use daily.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a very uncomfortable and not very psychologically-helpful turn towards [a] technologically solving for all sorts of difficult human emotions,\u201d Kasket said. \u201cYou\u2019ll hear some founders saying, \u2018Oh, we\u2019d like to solve for grief in 10 years,\u2019 which I think is a really ridiculous notion.\u201d<\/p>\n

Grief is \u201cextremely idiosyncratic,\u201d she explained, adding different grievers could have very different reactions to the same profile developed from digital remains.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Kasket said technologies like the one described in a patent undermine closure. Sherry Turkle, a sociologist, psychologist, and founding director of the MIT Initiative on Technology, agrees, adding that while this might seem like a small-scale proposal, large-scale efforts are on the horizon.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cTechnology has always been used in rituals that are designed to make death bearable,\u201d Turkle told Fortune<\/em> in an email.Photography was initially envisioned as a way to capture faces at the moment of death, she explained, and recording was similarly envisaged to capture someone\u2019s last words. Meta\u2019s plans build off those ideas but interrupts the grieving process, she wrote. The ability to apologize to the dead or tell them that you love them or are thinking about them, allows people to mourn, grow, and change, she added.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cNow, in Meta\u2019s plan, we deny death to participate in a perpetual fantasy life. The seance never has to end,\u201d she wrote.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

#live #Meta #patented #model #profile #active #die<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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