‘Image may contain... cat?’ – now Facebook can talk you through your photos

Blind users of the social network can have images described to them - although we shouldn't stop captioning and tagging just yet

If you post a picture of a cat on Facebook, a bunch of people will immediately identify it as a cat - but now Facebook automatically knows it's a cat, too. This could be seen as another invasion of our online privacy, but for the visually impaired it's incredibly useful: with the help of Apple's VoiceOver software, phones and tablets using the Facebook app can now tell you what might be in the picture. "Image may contain: cat," the audio software says when I tap on the photo. Correct! So I try a dog. "Image may contain: grass, outdoor, nature," it says. Ah. It missed a huge golden retriever. Still, nice try.

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