2020考研学子们，在备考公共课英语科目时，别忘记关注下考研英语经济学人杂志中的文章!因为英语试卷中的阅读理解文章，有些可能会节选自经济学人中的内容。下面，北京文都考研网为帮助考生提升英语水平，整理出英语经济学人:ZAO唤起了中国人的隐私意识，供考生参考。
2020考研英语经济学人:ZAO唤起了中国人的隐私意识
A backlash against a popular app’s data-grubbing terms of service are the latest example of growing concerns about misuse of personal information
对一款流行App流氓数据服务条约的强烈抵制，正是人们日益担忧个人信息遭到滥用的新例证
On the night of August 30th, soon after ZAO—an app whose name means “to make”—was launched, it proved so wildly popular that its servers crashed repeatedly. Almost as rapidly, a sudden backlash from its many fans nearly unmade it.
8月30日晚，一款名为“ZAO”的应用程序一经发布，服务器便屡次崩溃，足以证明其广受人们的欢迎。与它的爆红几乎同样迅速的是，许多粉丝突如其来的强烈抵制几乎将其打回了原形。
Technology-news outlets and meticulous netizens who had combed through the terms of its user agreement found that by signing up, users had granted ZAO “completely free”, “irrevocable” and “perpetual” rights to all content they uploaded to its platform.
科技新闻媒体和细心的网友对“ZAO”的用户协议仔细地研究后发现，用户一旦注册，“ZAO”便拥有了“完全免费”、“不可撤销”和“永久”使用用户上传至平台上的内容的权利。
Furious comments flooded Apple’s app store in China, where ZAO is now rated a measly two stars out of five. (This did not stop it from becoming China’s most-downloaded free app in the store.)
负面评论淹没了苹果中国区应用商店，如今“ZAO”的评分仅为2星/5星。(但这并不妨碍其成为苹果中国区应用商店下载量最多的免费应用。)
WeChat, a dominant Chinese app—always eager to stick it to a potential rival—blocked ZAO links from being shared on its messaging service citing “security risks”. ZAO swiftly removed the offending clause. On September 3rd it apologised to users and pledged to protect their personal data “in every possible way”.
微信(这款占主导地位的应用程序总是急切地对它的潜在竞争对手采取行动)以“存在安全风险”为由屏蔽了“ZAO”的分享链接。“ZAO”迅速删掉了这一争议性条款。9月3日，“ZAO”向用户道歉，并承诺将“尽一切可能”保护用户的个人信息。
So why did ZAO hit a nerve? One reason is that it appears to belong to a new crop of apps that generate “deepfakes”, computational creations that use artificial intelligence to doctor video footage.
那么，“ZAO”为何会触及到人们的神经呢?“ZAO”似乎属于能够实现“深度换脸”(一种利用人工智能篡改视频片段的技术)的一众新应用程序中的一员。
One form involves pasting a face onto someone else’s body—in ZAO’S tantalising offering, your kisser can be stitched onto the svelte silhouette of an actor or actress in a hit film or television drama.
其中的一种形式就是把一个人的脸置换在另一个人的身体上——“ZAO”吸引人们之处正是可以把你的吻贴到热播电影或电视剧中男演员或女演员的苗条身段上。
Until recently such fakery had required hundreds of images to conjure a convincing clip. But deepfake technology has rapidly improved.
直到近来，想要做出这种以假乱真的换脸视频片段尚需数百张照片。但“深度换脸”技术已经得到了突飞猛进的发展。“
ZAO’s winning claim is that, as its slogan promises, it takes “just one photo for you to star in all the world’s shows”. But for the best result, ZAO requires precise facial mapping, which users can feed into the app by following prompts to blink and move their mouths about.
ZAO”之所以能够爆红，正如其口号所说的那样“仅需一张照片,出演天下好戏”。但为了实现比较佳的效果，“ZAO”需要得到精确的面部地图，用户则根据提示眨眼和张嘴，将精确的面部地图输入了“ZAO”。
When ZAO’s grasping terms of service came to light, many users were alarmed at the idea of these biometric data being misused. Facial verification is being widely tested in China: to pay in supermarkets, glide through the gates at railway stations and even withdraw cash.
当“ZAO”的流氓用户协议被曝光后，许多用户担心这些生物特征数据会被滥用。在中国，人脸识别技术正在被广泛测试：超市付款、火车站进站、甚至是取款。
On September 1st Alipay, a big payment app, assured users that “images created through face-swapping apps, no matter how realistic, cannot trick our system”.
9月1日，支付宝(一款大型支付类应用程序)向用户保证，“通过换脸应用生成的人像，不管换的有多逼真，都是无法突破刷脸支付的”。
The government, too, has taken note. On September 4th it summoned Momo, a Chinese dating-app giant with ties to ZAO, to explain itself and launched an inquiry into the company’s “data-safety issues”.
它也同样引起了政府的注意。9月4日，政府相关部门约谈了陌陌(与“ZAO”相关联的一家中国约会应用巨头)，要求其对此作出解释，并且还对该公司的“数据安全问题”展开了调查。
【词汇】
backlash ['bæklæʃ] n. 反冲;强烈抵制 vt. 强烈反对;发生后冲
meticulous [mə'tɪkjələs] adj. 一丝不苟的;小心翼翼的;拘泥小节的
irrevocable [ɪ'rɛvəkəbl] adj. 不可改变的;不能取消的;不能挽回的
silhouette [,sɪlu'ɛt] n. 轮廓，剪影 vt. 使…照出影子来;使…仅仅显出轮廓
conjure ['kʌndʒɚ] vt. 提出，想象;恳求 vi. 施魔法;变魔术
以上是北京文都考研网分享的——“2020考研英语经济学人:ZAO唤起了中国人的隐私意识”，希望对2020考研者在复习英语上面有所帮助!祝2020考研凯旋归来!
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