Beata Zawrzel/NurPhoto via Getty ImagesFor years, Pinterest has been dubbed the go-to social media site for seeing inspirational mood boards, tracking lifestyle, fashion, and beauty trends, and finding niche and popular consumer-based products. However, the site has recently been plagued with an onslaught of AI slop, making it difficult for users to decipher what's real, human-made content, or fake.Pinterest users have taken to Reddit to vent about the app's changing landscape since the AI influx. Some users have even called the issue "The Enshittification of Pinterest."Also: This new AI benchmark measures how much models lieA common complaint is that AI-generated pins are now dominating people's feeds. One Reddit post explains that the app is becoming unusable because "it feels like Pinterest prioritizes automation and AI over user experience, which limits creativity and real inspiration."Another Reddit user detailed how they're "bombarded" with ads when they open the app. Onecommentreads: "I stopped using Pinterest because 80% of the results are AI-generated images," in response to an active thread speaking out against AI slop on the platform.Also: AI scams have infiltrated the knitting and crochet world - why it matters for everyoneBecause AI has infiltrated popular Pinterest categories, much of the slop often links to AI-powered content-farming sites that pose as DIY blogs, blending the AI-generated imagery with the site's human-made content. This use of AI slop results in SEO spammers profiting off the display ads attached to these content-farming pages.AI inspo or AI slop?The abundance of AI slop on Pinterest and other social media platforms, full of "inspo" or aspirational content, also hurts small businesses.According to the Washington Post, AI inspo refers to AI-generated photos that "customers find [and] reflect unattainable standards or incorporate impossible details, making it hard for real-world businesses to meet client's demands." Also:OpenAI's o1 lies more than any major AI model. Why that mattersSmall business owners have noticed an increase in situations where they have to explain to their clients how to spot AI-generated imagery and why it's not a realistic inspiration, especially for events such as weddings, hairstyles, and even plastic surgery. Washington PostHowever, according to a Pinterest spokesperson: "Impressions on generative AI content make up a small percentage of the total impressions on Pinterest. As people continue experimenting with generative AI content, we are working to provide users with more control and context over the content they see on Pinterest. Pinterest will continue intentionally leveraging AI, such as our inclusive AI features, to enhance the experience for our users and creators." How to spot AI slop on Pinterest The top results for most of the searches I attempted were rife with AI-generated pins, spanning from "nail art" to "cozy loft apartment interior design" and specific hairstyles ranging from "braided hairstyles" to "pixie cut styles for black women". Take a search for "braided hairstyles for black women" which, when compared to other hairstyle searches, is not flooded with AI-generated images. Still, after scrolling through the first couple of rows, I came across an AI-generated hairstyle that is not only hard to replicate in real life but is also linked to an AI-generated blog explicitly tailored for black women's hairstyles: Pinterest/ZDNETI tried this tactic again for the more common search, "comfort dinner recipes", and was immediately bombarded with AI-generated posts linked to spammy blog sites. All the pinned recipes in the first row, except one, were AI-generated. The recipes also seemed to have been created by fake food bloggers with AI-generated profiles. For example, the first recipe, "Marry me chicken pasta", has about 2,000 likes and 500 comments. However, the so-called food blogger behind the post, "Emilia", has no last name, and her profile pic is AI-generated.Like other fake food blogs, the person running the site claims to be a "busy mom" interested in "family-friendly" quick-to-make meals but advises site viewers that some recipes may be tagged with affiliate links -- usually Amazon. Screenshot by Matene Toure/ZDNETThis approach was common amongst food-related searches, such as "easy breakfast ideas", where the top pins are generally AI-generated images of popular food dishes linked to fake blog websites run by generic mononyms. How to avoid AI slop on PinterestTo avoid AI slop, I recommend being as specific as possible in popular searches. For food content, I found that searches such as "low-calorie meals" or "high-protein vegan recipes for breakfast" had fewer AI-generated pins. Even though most pins are linked to blogs, they appeared to be free of AI-generated profiles and run by actual people.Also:Will synthetic data derail generative AI's momentum or be the breakthrough we need?Atemporary fixfor blocking AI images posted on Reddit details that if you use Firefox, you can get the extension uBlock Origin. Within that extension, there's the option to blacklist certain IPs. There's a handy list of blocked IPs that you can use, and it works like a charm. This is the script. You can put this script into uBlacklist which essentially does the same thing.However, the platform's abundant amount of AI slop spans numerous topics and searches, and it's hard to navigate that mess as a user looking for human-made content, especially for more instructional DIY pins, such as recipes or home decor projects. For instance, when I searched "studio apartment layout ideas", the results appeared clear of AI slop. Yet after a closer look, I noticed that the top pins used pictures of actual studio apartments to entice users to click. Then, these pins redirected me to AI-generated blogs with listicles of AI-generated images of apartments with little to no instructional advice about layout design. I noticed that the images were AI-generated because they had an unnatural sheen. Upon looking closely, objects in the photos, such as plants or books, looked fake. And the books also never had titles on them. It's important to note that many of these content-farming pages that use AI images and text are run by SEO spammers who use various AI models to generate dozens of fake articles on an AI-generated site under counterfeit names that they then pin to Pinterest for click-based revenue. Pinterest's recent AI pivot Currently, Pinterest isexperimentingwith labelingGen AI-enhanced content. The social media site also recently introduced Pinterest Performance+, a suite ofad-focused AI toolsfor marketers who want to create product ads using Gen AI.In addition, Pinterest added a new clauseto the company's website outlining how Pinterest will employ its users' "information to train, develop and improve our technology such as our machine learning models, regardless of when Pins were posted."This approach would include, for example, Pinterest's body type technology, "which is trained on images in Pins posted to our Services."Also:Most AI voice cloning tools aren't safe from scammers, Consumer Reports findsThe company suggests its goal is to "improve the products and services of our family of companies and offer new features". In the past, Pinterest expressed similar sentiments when announcing it would use personal data to train Pinterest Canvas, the platform's Gen AI model.However, there is an opt-out button for AI training, and the company also says it doesn't train its models on data from minor users. To opt out, users must visit the Privacy and Data Settings, which you can access on your profile page. Under the Gen AI section, switch off the button for "use data to train Pinterest Canvas". I would also recommend opting out of targeted advertising activities, such as "Use info from sites you visit" and "Ads off Pinterest".Yet asPinterest continues to move into the e-commerce spaceand away from the aspirational content the platform was built on, AI slop is likely to be a recurring issue.Artificial Intelligence Editorial standards