How Deepfakes Affect Society (Ethan)

How Do Deepfakes Affect Society? Here's What You Need To Know: 

You all may be wondering if you don't already know; what exactly IS a deepfake? For those who hearing this term for the first time, a deepfake is a form of media such as a picture or video of a person that is digitally modified/photoshopped to look like someone else to spread misinformation on the internet. Deepfakes have been getting more and more scary every single day and have people wondering if certain videos and images are actually real. Deepfakes have also been rapidly evolving over the past years as AI services are becoming more and more popular and recognized. This means that not only do deepfakes deceive the eyes, they also deceive the ears. When I say this, I mean that a video may be modified by including an AI voice cover of someone's voice (in most cases celebrities) to deceive viewers. For example, people are able to make videos of people like presidents saying things they have never truly said themselves which causes massive controversies on all media platforms. 

Now that you have an idea of what deepfakes are, lets dive into the affects they have on society. First of all, deepfakes have the world constantly playing a guessing game of whether the content they are seeing is true or not. It has been revealed that deepfake images are mainly used for sexual purposes such as putting peoples faces (in most cases celebrities) on pornstars' bodies. They can also be used for other purposes such as inserting celebrities' faces on people in certain locations that they were never truly at in the first place and immediately spark online controversy on whether they were truly at the location such as alternate countries or public spaces. Also, deepfakes are never really used for any good, mainly just to make others look bad or to give people sexual pleasure. 

Deepfakes can also be used to trick media users into believing that people that don't exist do really exist. The term used to define people that do not exist and were "brought to life" by a deepfake are referred to as "sock-puppets". Sock-puppets are made and used for propaganda, negative persuasion and catfishing users online. 

All of these scares and propaganda have already and will continue to deeply impact the future of online sources and social media and will only get people to believe things that are not true. With the way technology is advancing, deepfakes only seem to be getting far more dangerous and threatful to social media users. 

With all this being said, what are your thoughts on deepfakes and why do you think people want to deceive others like this online? Make sure to leave a comment with your thoughts :) 

Ethan Hendricks (CC BY-NC)