What: MIT has become the latest in a series of institutions warning of the dangers of deepfake videos with a mock interview of Russia’s President Vladimir Putin. Kind of.
During EmTech, a conference by MIT Technology Review, a presenter impersonates Putin in a make-believe interview discussing Russia’s potential intervention in the upcoming elections in the US.
Why: Though this time, the switch was obvious, it was intended as a reminder of the risks associated with AI in media and anything else for that matter.
The neck-breaking pace of advancement has caught even some of the leading experts by surprise.
And now what: ‘Wow, this is developing more rapidly than I thought.’, said Hao Li, a professor at the University of South Carolina and a deepfake pioneer.
Give it two or three years and “there will be no way to tell if it’s real or not”, he thinks.
Watch Putin’s look-alike here