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How to Stop People Using Your Photos with Muse Image AI

Meta’s Muse Image lets other users remix your public Instagram photos with AI by tagging you. Here’s what the feature does and how to disable it.

2026/07/08

What's happening with my photos?

When Meta launched Muse Image on July 7, 2026, it included a feature that caught many users off guard: anyone can take images from a public Instagram profile and remix them with AI — they simply tag the account, and Muse Image uses those photos as source material for new AI-generated images.

The feature applies to public profiles. TechCrunch and other outlets reported immediate user pushback over the idea that being public on Instagram now also means being remixable by AI.

What Meta says

Meta's position is that people "have control" over this: there are account settings that let you opt out of your photos being used this way. The feature is on by default for public accounts — which is exactly why so many people are searching for how to turn it off.

How to disable it

As of this writing, Meta exposes the control in your Instagram/Meta account settings:

  1. Open Instagram → Settings.
  2. Look for the privacy or AI section covering how others can use your content with AI features (Meta has been iterating on the exact menu naming since launch — check sections named "AI", "Tags and mentions", or "Content use").
  3. Turn off the option allowing others to use your photos in AI creations.
  4. If you can't find the setting, the blunt instrument works too: switch your account to private, which removes your photos from the pool entirely.

Because Meta adjusts these menus frequently, if the path above has moved, search "AI" inside the Instagram settings search bar — the opt-out has consistently lived behind that keyword.

Should you also worry as a non-user?

The feature draws on public Instagram photos. If you don't have an Instagram account, your photos aren't part of this particular feature. If you have a dormant public account, the setting (or going private) still applies to you — worth doing even if you no longer post.

The bigger picture

This controversy is a useful reminder of the trade-off with platform AI tools: Muse Image is free, but it lives inside Meta's ecosystem, on Meta's terms, with Meta's defaults. If you want AI image generation without connecting it to your social identity at all, that's exactly why independent tools exist:

Generate images on MuseImage → — no Meta account, no connection to your social profiles, free credits on signup.

MuseImage is an independent product and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by Meta Platforms, Inc. Setting locations described here reflect public reporting at the time of writing and may change as Meta updates its apps.