{"id":18406,"date":"2022-03-02T05:10:08","date_gmt":"2022-03-02T13:10:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.palada.net\/index.php\/2022\/03\/02\/news-12139\/"},"modified":"2022-03-02T05:10:08","modified_gmt":"2022-03-02T13:10:08","slug":"news-12139","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.palada.net\/index.php\/2022\/03\/02\/news-12139\/","title":{"rendered":"Deepfake study suggests fakes can run but not hide"},"content":{"rendered":"

Credit to Author: Christopher Boyd| Date: Wed, 02 Mar 2022 12:25:08 +0000<\/strong><\/p>\n

I have long said that Deepfakes missed the boat on being stealthy, believable pieces of footage able to turn the tide of elections or other major events. We\u2019ve seen time and again how suggested examples of use during important happenings have been terrible<\/a>, whereas the smart use has tended to be quiet, low level affairs<\/a> as a stepping stone rather than an end goal.<\/p>\n

The other stance on this is that people will find moving imagery more believable than photographs or AI generated text. This is an entirely fair point of view, and we can\u2019t really say for sure that nothing seriously bad on the global scale will ever come from a deepfake. However, one study suggests the fakers still have a way to go before that becomes a possibility.<\/p>\n

Audio and visual clues<\/h2>\n

The Register reports<\/a> that researchers at MIT have pulled the rug on the whole deepfake issue. Just over 5,000 people participated in a video\/audio versus text transcript showdown. The task: figure out whether audio, video\/audio, and text transcripts of Joe Biden and Donald Trump were real or fake. The results:<\/p>\n

Video and audio<\/strong>: 82% guessed correctly<\/p>\n

Audio only<\/strong>: 76% guessed correctly<\/p>\n

Text only<\/strong>: 57% guessed correctly<\/p>\n

One would assume text only is going to be quite the dice-throw. In terms of video, are we getting better at spotting the joins, the edits, the slight uncanny valley effect in most deepfake content? Have we somehow trained ourselves to know when something isn\u2019t right by virtue of having seen so many pieces of deepfake content over the last few years?<\/p>\n

These aren\u2019t questions we have answers for yet, although as always, we may have more pressing concerns anyway.<\/p>\n

Who needs Deepfakes?<\/h2>\n

I’m a fan of the path of least resistance idea where deepfakes are concerned. That is to say, are there simpler ways to achieve the desired effect of a deepfake with simpler methods? And, if so, why even reach for the deepfake in the first place? It’s a lot of hard work for something with a big risk of little to no pay off.<\/p>\n

A good case in point: the many, many pieces of dis\/misinformation currently surrounding events in Ukraine. Deepfakes aren\u2019t being used; it\u2019s just regular footage<\/a> spliced in whatever way is required. Tricky, sophisticated AI generated fakes may not be required when simple photographs or viral videos are mislabeled and made viral.<\/p>\n

In the last few days alone, we\u2019ve seen several examples of this phenomenon doing big numbers on social media, quite often promoted by verified (and perhaps mistaken as authoritative) commentators on social media:<\/p>\n

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My strikes:
– the tiktok of the woman showing how to drive a tank
– the photo of Ukrainian kids saluting tanks (old photo)
– news of mayor saying Kiev was encircled
2\/3 of were me retweeting other verified users who themselves had been trigger happy<\/p>\n

— David Carroll (@profcarroll) March 1, 2022<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n