AI poses an obvious danger to millennia-long human fight to find the truth. Large language model “hallucinations,” vocal deepfakes, and now increased use of video deepfakes have all had a blurring effect on facts, letting bad actors around the globe brush off even recorded events as mere “fake news.” The danger is perhaps most acute in the political realm, where deepfake audio and video can make any politician say or appear to do anything. In such a climate, our most senior elected officials have a special duty to model truth-seeking behavior and responsible AI use. But what’s the fun in that, when you can just blow up negotiations over a budget impasse by posting a deepfake video of your political opponents calling themselves “a bunch of woke pieces of shit” while mariachi music plays in the background? Oh—and did I mention the fake mustache? Or the CGI sombrero? On Monday night, the president of the United States, a man with access to the greatest intelligence-gathering operation in the world, posted to his Truth Social account a 35-second AI-generated video filled with crude insults, racial overtones, and bizarre conspiracy theories. The video targeted two Democratic leaders who had recently been meeting with Trump over a possible agreement to fund the government; I would have thought this kind of video was a pretty poor way to get people to agree with you, but, apparently, AI-generated insults are the real “art of the deal.” In the clip, a deepfake version of Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) utters a surreal monologue as his colleague Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) looks on… in a sombrero.
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