Deepfake: The Dangers of Modern Technology

Deepfake technology is a thing of today: it’s no longer a what-if situation we conspire thinking of futuristic technology. Recently, Deepfake technology has made an appearance on the news for an account on TikTok that had posted multiple Deepfakes of Tom Cruise that failed multiple Deepfake detection software. Some experts said it was the best they’ve seen in an article by fortune. 

 

Chris Ume, the creator of these deep fakes, believes this technology should be regulated, but going at the rate of new technical regulations there is little indication of this happening any time soon.

Deepfakes are commonly targeting women and celebrities by putting their faces in pornographic videos. With no regulations, these innocent women and celebrities have nothing to protect them in these situations. 

 

Helen Mort, a victim of Deepfakes, is a poet who had her pregnancy photos from her private Instagram, and a Facebook profile that she had deleted, put in violent pornographic videos. The perpetrator then encouraged other users to do the same. 

 

Many of the photos and videos were bad photoshop, but some looked “chillingly realistic”, Technology Review describes. 

 

Mort started not to trust her family and friends and even started to doubt her ex-husband. 

 

While deep-fake porn is illegal in Virginia and California, it’s being pushed to be a federal crime. 

 

Deepfakes have been traced back to 2018, 90% of which is deep fake porn almost entirely just-women. Deep fake porn is a “female violence issue”, says Adam Dodge to Technology Review. 

 

Female-targeted sexual violence seems to be the target of these crimes, but blackmail seems to be a second-most-common use of deepfake.  

 

In France, a foreign minister’s voice was used in a recent fraud crime. In Britain, the CEO of the British Energy Firm was tricked out of $243,000 with a Deepfake auditory scam. 

 

Deepfakes will advance and become better and better; technology advancement is inevitable which in return makes it harder to protect ourselves. 

 

To prevent yourself from the dangers of Deepfake scams and sexual harassment, educate yourself on the dangers of social media and on modern technology.