Former Senior Adviser to Kamala Harris. Founder of Authentic. Organizer of White Dudes for Harris. Raised $1B+ in small-dollar online donations. Expert in AI, emerging tech, digital advertising. Mental health advocate.✌️
Deepfake was one of the most searched words in 2023, according to Merriam-Webster yesterday. That's an encouraging sign, imho. Deepfakes are going to be a tremendous issue in the 2024 elections. I remember in 2020 when a right-wing disinformation group ran false ads in Ohio about Trump being endorsed by Pope Francis. The 2024 version of that will be a deepfake video of Pope Francis giving Trump a hug. I imagine him wearing a puffy jacket... if it matters. Here's the deal: ↳ AI deepfakes will be used to confuse voters. ↳ AI deepfakes will be used to distract the media. ↳ AI deepfakes will be used to weaken our democracy. I hope the social media companies crack down on deepfakes and invest in the tools (tech + humans) to combat deepfakes, but I'm not especially encouraged given their history. IMHO, the only real answer to this challenge is more education, from the media itself but also directly by our elected leaders, our campaigns, and organizations. We need to educate our supporters and our voters and give them the tools to be much more discerning about what they’re consuming online. I hope every campaign and electoral organization is thinking about how best to combat this challenge heading into a presidential election year. P.S. A reminder — here are my 7 tips for spotting deepfakes on social media: 1. Look for unusual eye movements 2. Check for color & lighting inconsistencies 3. Listen for mismatched audio quality 4. Observe odd body movements 5. Track unnatural facial expressions 6. Ask if the background noise matches 7. Double-check the video source
