No, Biden Didn’t Call You Yesterday

Unknown criminals are blasting New Hampshire Democrats with an apparently AI-generated robocall of President Biden in what the state’s Attorney General is calling an “unlawful attempt” to suppress the vote. Ed Begley Jr. Talks Climate Change and Sustainability “Voting this Tuesday only enables the Republicans in their quest to elect Donald Trump again,” robo-Biden says … Read more

This AI Safety Summit Is a Doomer’s Paradise

Photo: Victor Moussa (Shutterstock) Leaders and policymakers from around the globe will gather in London next week for the world’s first artificial intelligence safety summit. Anyone hoping for a practical discussion of near-term AI harms and risks will likely be disappointed. A new discussion paper released ahead of the summit this week gives a little … Read more

Victims of Deepfakes Are Fighting Back

Anyone who’s spent a moment observing US political chatter in recent months has probably encountered the following prediction: 2024 will yield the world’s first deepfake election. Rapidly evolving AI video and audio generators powered by large language models have already been used by both Donald Trump and Ron DeSantis’ presidential campaigns to smear each other … Read more

Putting a Real Face on Deepfake Porn

For Taylor Klein, it starts with a weird Facebook message from a friend. A Pornhub link. She doesn’t open it. Must be spam, she figures. “I think you’ve been hacked?” she replies. Nope. Her pal insists the link is real. She clicks, and her nightmare begins. Another Body, directed by Sophie Compton and Reuben Hamlyn, … Read more

Deepfake Porn Is Out of Control

Many of the websites make it clear they host or spread deepfake porn videos—often featuring the word deepfakes or derivatives of it in their name. The top two websites contain 44,000 videos each, while five others host more than 10,000 deepfake videos. Most of them have several thousand videos, while some only list a few … Read more

New Study Shows AI Might Consume as Much Energy as a Country

Headlines This Week A new report from Politico suggests a “billionaire-backed network” of Silicon Valley-linked AI “advisors” are working to control the regulatory agenda in Washington D.C. Boy, I sure wish stuff like that were illegal instead of just business-as-usual. Despite apparently having lobbying money aplenty, it looks like the AI industry is still struggling … Read more

An Alleged Deepfake of UK Opposition Leader Keir Starmer Shows the Dangers of Fake Audio

As members of the UK’s largest opposition party gathered in Liverpool for their party conference—probably their last before the UK holds a general election—a potentially explosive audio file started circulating on X, formerly known as Twitter. The 25-second recording was posted by an X account with the handle “@Leo_Hutz” that was set up in January … Read more

Generative AI Is the Newest Tool in the Dictator’s Handbook

When protests in Pakistan earlier this year escalated into clashes between pro-government forces and supporters of former Prime Minister Imran Khan, the now-imprisoned leader turned to social media to bolster his message. Khan shared this brief video clip on Twitter showing his supporters holding up signs with his face on them and chanting his name. … Read more

AI Deepfake Ads: Tom Hanks, Gayle King Sound Warning

Tom Hanks is pretty recognizable, whether he’s holding a box of chocolates in Forrest Gump or wearing a space suit in Apollo 13. But should you see a dental insurance ad with his picture, look twice. It’s not really the Oscar-winning actor. “Beware!” Hanks wrote on Instagram this weekend. “There’s a video out there promoting … Read more