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'Deepfakes', the lurking scourge
Deepfake pornography first emerged on the internet in 2017 on Reddit, a network of communities based on people’s interests, using British and American actresses without their consent.
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Illustration of deepfake video (Shutterstock/Lightspring)
It looks real. It sounds authentic. It is a fake video. It is a deepfake product.
Using ever-improving machine-learning technology, “deepfakes” fabricate audio and video recordings. They show people doing and saying things they never did or said.
This tool in manufacturing believable falsehoods should be a hot-button issue at the 2020 National Press Day conference in Banjarmasin, the provincial capital of South Kalimantan, from Feb. 7 to 9.
Indeed, a high-level panel will discuss the problems linking conventional media and social media, a platform where deepfakes freely operate.
The scheduled panelists are media magnates CT Corp. chair Chairul Tanjung, Media Nusantara Citra chair Hary Tanoesoedibjo, BeritaSatu founder James Riady, House of Representatives’ Commission I overseeing foreign affairs and the press chair Meutya Hafid, and Kompas daily senior editor Ninok Leksono.
The seriousness of deepfakes as a malicious media tool is that they “undermine truth and threaten democracy”. Boston University law professor and deepfake scholar Danielle Citron stated in a 2019 TED talk.
Moreover, insidious deepfakes can ruin the reputation of individuals, stoke hate and trigger distrust of democratic institutions such as the electoral system.
