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Deepfake Watch 14

Deepfake Watch 14

How Deep Is Your Fake | Deepfake Watch

May 03, 2024 • Estimated Reading Time: 9 minutes

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Not all fakes are ‘deep’. Most are the ‘cheap’ and ‘shallow’ types. But the term ‘deepfakes’ keeps getting thrown around like a clichéd buzzword. And it has been misused by the top brass - from the prime minister to the mainstream media.

Let’s set the record straight - deepfakes aren’t just any type of altered media - they’re done using artificial intelligence. The term is a portmanteau of ‘deep’ and ‘fakes’, where deep refers to deep learning - a subset of machine learning that deploys multi-layered deep neural networks, to simulate the human brain.

In India, we mostly get to see ‘cheap fakes’ or ‘shallow fakes’ - where the alterations are done manually through various editing tools. That’s the real menace. And it's crucial for us to be able to tell the ‘deep’ from the ‘cheap’.

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The boy who cried ‘deepfakes’

Certain Congress-linked accounts recently shared a video of Home Minister Amit Shah, where he can be seen promising an end to reservations. The video was immediately labelled as a deepfake. Prime Minister Narendra Modi mentioned ‘artificial intelligence’ while referring to the video while speaking at a rally in Maharashtra.

The Indian media followed suit.

But it wasn’t a deepfake. BOOM found that the video had been altered using old school editing tools, and decontextualised a speech by Shah ahead of the Telangana elections last year, where he promised an end to reservations for Muslims specifically, if BJP came to power.

Then came the video of UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, where he is purportedly questioning Modi about the 'mangalsutras' of the widows of the security personnel who died in the Pulwama terror attack.

UP Police called it an AI-generated deepfake - and media outlets jumped at those buzzwords.

And they got it wrong - yet again. BOOM analysed the video, and found it to be similarly doctored as Shah’s video, using editing tools. The original video showed Adityanath quoting Samajwadi Party leader Dimple Yadav, which was decontexualised to make it seem like his own quote.

There are more such instances.

Days before the first phase of elections, a video of Dinesh Lal Yadav, BJP candidate from Azamgarh, went viral, where he could be seen speaking on how Modi and Adityanath have preferred to be childless to stop unemployment. BJP IT Cell head Amit Malviya tweeted out claiming the video was a deepfake.

BOOM analysed the video using deepfake detection tools, and also retrieved the original video file from the reporter who shot it, which confirmed that the video was authentic, and not a deepfake.

Last year, Modi was addressing the media at a Diwali Milan organised by BJP at its national headquarters in New Delhi, and he tried to highlight the threat of ‘deepfakes’. As an example, he referred to a video he had seen of himself dancing garba, and called it a deepfake.

BOOM had fact-checked that video, and found it to be very much real. It showed a Modi-lookalike named Vikas Mahante dancing garba at a Diwali event in the UK.

Ignorance and deception

Prateek Waghre, Executive Director at the Internet Freedom Foundation, believes we’re dealing with two separate issues here.

"One could be the lack of awareness in terms of the difference between an edited version, a 'cheapfake' and a deepfake. The other is the outright dismissing of evidence by calling it a deepfake," Prateek tells me over a call.

📑 Read: The Problem With Wrongly Labelling Real Or Edited Videos As 'Deepfakes' | BOOM

He stresses on the need to take it slow with regulations on AI, as the lack of clarity of the terms might end up doing more harm.

This is not to say that political deepfakes aren’t doing rounds of the internet.

Will the Real Political Deepfakes please stand up

Here are all the election-related deepfakes we’ve reported on, and fact-checked:

There may be more lurking around in the unseen corners of the internet, or on some of your WhatsApp groups. If you are doubtful, send it over to our WhatsApp tipline, or email it to us at [email protected].

Updates From Around The World

Here are some interesting reports on deepfakes from around the world, that might be worth your while:

Have you been a victim of AI?

Have you been scammed by AI-generated videos or audio clips? Did you spot AI-generated nudes of yourself on the internet?

Decode is trying to document cases of abuse of AI, and would like to hear from you. If you are willing to share your experience, do reach out to us at [email protected]. Your privacy is important to us, and we shall preserve your anonymity.

About Decode and Deepfake Watch

Deepfake Watch is an initiative by Decode, dedicated to keeping you abreast of the latest developments in AI and its potential for misuse. Our goal is to foster an informed community capable of challenging digital deceptions and advocating for a transparent digital environment.

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