Meta AI has been observed to focus excessively on turbans when generating images of Indian men

The issue of bias in AI image generators has been extensively studied and reported, yet consumer tools continue to display significant cultural biases. Meta’s AI chatbot is the latest example, demonstrating a curious inclination to add turbans to images of Indian men.

Meta recently introduced its AI across various platforms such as WhatsApp, Instagram, Facebook, and Messenger, with a rollout in select regions, including India, one of the largest markets globally.

During  AI testing process, we explored culture-specific queries and discovered that Meta is blocking election-related queries in India due to the ongoing general elections. However, our examination of Imagine, Meta AI’s new image generator, revealed a distinct tendency to generate images of Indian men wearing turbans, among other biases.

conducted tests with different prompts, generating over 50 images to explore various scenarios. These images, minus a few exceptions like “a German driver,” allowed us to observe how the system portrayed different cultures. It’s important to note that our approach lacked a scientific methodology, and we did not assess inaccuracies in object or scene representation beyond the cultural context.

While it’s true that many men in India wear turbans, the frequency depicted by Meta AI’s tool far exceeds reality. In India’s capital, Delhi, for instance, the ratio is closer to one in 15 men wearing a turban at most. However, in the images generated by Meta’s AI, approximately three to four out of five representations of Indian males featured turbans.

For example, when prompted with “An Indian walking on the street,” all the resulting images depicted men wearing turbans.