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Experts warn: Realistic deepfakes easier than ever, only more AI can fight back
Realistic deepfakes have become easier than ever due to advancements in AI, and scammers are using them to target politicians, corporations, and individuals.
Thanks to advances in artificial intelligence, creating realistic deepfakes is now easier than ever. This development poses significant security problems for governments, businesses, and private individuals, making trust the most valuable currency of the digital age. Responding to this challenge will require a multi-pronged approach, including new laws, enhanced digital literacy, and technical solutions that fight AI with more AI.
"As humans, we are remarkably susceptible to deception," notes Vijay Balasubramaniyan, CEO and founder of the tech firm Pindrop Security. However, he believes solutions to the deepfake challenge are within reach: "We are going to fight back."
AI Deepfakes: A national security threat
The national security implications are immense. For instance, individuals who believe they're chatting with a government minister or military officer might inadvertently discuss sensitive information related to diplomatic negotiations or military strategy.
"You're either trying to extract sensitive secrets or competitive information, or you're going after access to an email server or other sensitive network," explains Kinny Chan, CEO of cybersecurity firm QiD, outlining potential motivations. Synthetic media can also be used to alter behavior.
Scammers target the financial industry
The increasing availability and sophistication of deepfake programs mean they're now frequently used for corporate espionage and garden-variety fraud.
"The financial industry is right in the crosshairs," states Jennifer Ewbank, a former deputy director of the CIA who focused on cybersecurity and digital threats. "Even individuals who know each other have been convinced to transfer vast sums of money."
In the context of corporate espionage, deepfakes can impersonate CEOs, instructing employees to hand over passwords or routing numbers. They can also enable scammers to apply for — and even perform — jobs under a false identity. For some, this is a way to access sensitive networks, steal secrets, or install ransomware. Others simply seek work, potentially holding multiple similar jobs at different companies simultaneously, gaining access to company networks and a paycheck. In some cases, these "workers" install ransomware that's later used for extortion.
Experts deploy AI to fight AI
Researchers, public policy experts, and technology companies are actively investigating the best ways to address the economic, political, and social challenges posed by deepfakes.
New regulations could mandate that tech companies do more to identify, label, and potentially remove deepfakes from their platforms. Lawmakers could also impose stricter penalties on those who use digital technology for deception, provided they can be apprehended.
Greater investments in digital literacy could also bolster people's immunity to online deception by teaching them how to spot fake media and avoid falling victim to scammers.
Ultimately, the best tool for catching AI-generated deception may be another AI program, one trained to detect the subtle flaws in deepfakes that would go unnoticed by a human. Systems to analyse millions of data points in a person's speech to quickly identify irregularities. This technology can be used during job interviews or other video conferences to detect if someone is using voice cloning software, for example.
Such programs may one day become commonplace, running in the background as people communicate online. Someday, deepfakes might go the way of email spam—a technological challenge that once threatened to undermine the usefulness of email, according to Balasubramaniyan.