No shortage of fumbling in the dark to neuter deepfakes

An article in a UK politics trade publication sees domestic lawmakers deliberately ignoring the dangers posed by deepfakes.

Maybe to rub some noses in their ignorance, that publication, The House, topped a news story with a vividly manufactured photo of former Prime Minister Boris Johnson in jail. The House is written mostly by parliamentarians about the institution.

It is one of several very recent voices added to the more-sober debates about where identity misappropriation is going next.

But deepfakes, whatever the challenge they pose to civil society, are not the root problem. That can be found in The House’s pitch to prospective members.

Ninety-two percent of subscribers surveyed said they act based on reading the publication, while 84 percent feel it is a trusted source. That means that 8 percent are acting on information they do not trust.

A June report on creating information integrity on digital platforms, from the United Nations, while still addressing identity misuse in a diffused way, takes a more foundational approach.

While it discusses red herrings like the attention economy, it also calls for actions by all member states to view digital communication as a way to recommit to information integrity, digital human rights, messaging transparency and user empowerment.

The report also calls for better, more commensurate responses to information misuse and disincentives.

Meanwhile a new disclosure law in the state of Washington takes a nibble out of the threat.

The legislation, signed in the spring, is intended to make it obvious to people when they view images produced by generative AI algorithms, whether they show a fictional person or an illustration of a real person. It only governs content related to elections and does not judge truthfulness.

Copies of the law could scarcely finished rolling out of the printer, when a candidate for United States president, the state of Florida’s governor, created election-related content falsely depicting someone else in his party hugging and kissing a one-time government appointee.

Article Topics

deepfakes  |  elections  |  generative AI  |  regulation  |  UK  |  United States