Lawmakers Worry About Rise of Fake Video Technology (thehill.com)

Lawmakers are concerned that advances in video manipulation technology could set off a new era of fake news. Now legislators say they want to start working on fixes to the problem before it's too late. From a report: Technology experts have begun to sound the alarm on the new software, which lets users take existing videos and make high-quality altered video and audio that appears real. The emergence of the technology opens up a new world of hoaxes driven by doctored audio or video, and threatens to shake faith in the media even further. Senator Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), one of the most vocal members of Congress on tech issues, painted a grim picture about what the advances could mean for the future of discerning truth in media. "Since we can't rely on the responsibility of individual actors or the platforms they use, I fully expect there will be a proliferation of these sorts of fictions to a degree that nearly drowns out actual facts," Wyden told The Hill. "For those who value real information, there will still be some reliable publications and news outlets, and their credibility will need to be guarded all the more intently by professional journalists," he added.

Comments

Threatened

[SuperKendall]

The media desperately want to keep a lock on being the only ones who can manipulate video for propaganda use.

Re:Threatened

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't be stupid, the media want to make money and sell their news. Besides, even if the media manipulated video for propaganda use, then having tens of thousands of additional lunatics manipulate videos in their mom's basement won't do any good either.

Making it common turns people's filter defaults into "It's probably fake" unlike before. The Falcon Heavy launch was an example for this. Lots of people thought it was fake until friends or friends of friends in florida confirmed it was real.

Re:Threatened

[jellomizer]

At least if lies are pointed out you can find the source.

However we are in a world were nearly all information cannot be trusted anymore. The validity of the information is up to our own sense, which is faulty, because our own bias true or not will be in affect.

I welcome news that challenges my world view, However if I cannot trust it (because other then truth they are pandering to other world views), I need to default back to my world view. I do not work in journalism, I don't have the time or resources to investigate every belief I have, and listening to the news and digging to find if it is true or not.

I use NPR as my primary news source, as I find it the most trustworthy, and they seem to be willing to report on their own errors. I am well aware their politics are left of center, but at least they put a good faith effort in showing the other side as well. But in today's world, who knows perhaps Fox News is actually a real source of truth, and my world view is completely screwed up, from being influenced by LiBeRaL MeDiA!

Re:Threatened

[DCFusor]

Didn't you mean "the government desperately want" or "the elite", MIC, or similar? As pointed out, Hollywood's been doing this for quite awhile. And our government admits to wanting to "control the narrative". They didn't even hide the RFP's for it. I'll just leave this here: https://phys.org/news/2011-10-...

Re:Threatened

[nospam007]

"I use NPR as my primary news source, as I find it the most trustworthy, "

In my case it' TheOnion, because albeit 'fake' at least it's funny.

Re:Threatened

[suutar]

Fair point. However, at least for video distributed by net, signatures should be a possibility, so it can at least be determined whether that video really was put out by CNN or whether someone altered something to look like it. Broadcast may (for a while at least) have to stick with "nobody else has a transmitter on that frequency" but digital channels can probably fit signatures in too, with some protocol tweaking.

Re:Threatened

[AmiMoJo]

I welcome news that challenges my world view, However if I cannot trust it (because other then truth they are pandering to other world views), I need to default back to my world view.

Trust isn't binary, it's a scale. I tend to trust the BBC quite a lot, for example, because although I don't always agree with their characterisation of events the factual stuff is usually right, and they post corrections.

There has been a push by those who benefit from fake news to make people think that one mistake makes a source completely untrustworthy to the point where you can safely ignore anything it says that contradicts your preferred reality. The BBC make an error once, CNN made some misleading statements, therefore they are fake news and no better than Brietbart or Infowars. And hay, at least Infowars isn't part of the dreaded MSM, at least they give you the real news that others dare not speak... And you are a smart guy, you can tell fake from true, so why not watch a bit of Fox and decide for yourself?

In reality prolonged exposure to Fox et. al causes brain damage that reduces a person's ability to smell bullshit.

who knows perhaps Fox News is actually a real source of truth

It definitely isn't. Stick to NPR.

Threatens to shake faith in the media even further

[DontBeAMoran]

I trust the media but I do not trust the people working in it nor the people they interview.

"To summarize [...]: people are a problem." — Douglas Adams

It gets even better....

[MitchDev]

...there is absolutely Fuck-All they can do about it.

"media" back to reporters?

[Anonymous Coward]

So, what they're saying is the media has to hire real journalists now and actually do their job correctly instead of bumming off reddit and twitter posts?

AI

[110010001000]

Wow. A story that mentions digital image manipulation that doesn't contain the word "AI". Impressive!

Re:AI

[PolygamousRanchKid]

A story that mentions digital image manipulation that doesn't contain the word "AI".

. . . they also failed to mention that the videos' integrity will be verified using Blockchain technology.

. . . and that no humans will be involved since it will use Automation technology.

Remember the Amiga

[randomErr]

The said that with the Amiga's Video Toaster. Yes kiddies, that was a thing. What we need is for the media to get out of our lives and people to turn of their devices and see what reality really is. I feel like we live in a Videodrome more and more each day.

The Amiga is roughly equivalent

[rsilvergun]

to those old Weird Al Yankovic interviews compared to what they have today.

A ton of work has been done on real time "photoshop". Like a lot of things the vanguard here was Adult movies and advertisements (I'm reminded of another old movie). Folks have been thinking about this and working on it for decades.

What we need is more education (and clean, lead free water and air). We probably also need to lessen deep seated religious devotion (since it tends to foster unquestioned obedience to authorities). Basically, we need an electorate that isn't just capable of critical thinking, but for whom critical thinking is the default state of being. This is all doable, but I'm not sure you can get Americans to pay for it. We get upset when we're told to pay for making other folks better.

that's gonna totally work!

[ooloorie]

Now legislators say they want to start working on fixes to the problem before it's too late.

Yeah, they are going to ban fake videos! It's gonna work just as well as banning underage drinking, poverty, pot smoking, illegal guns, prostitution, and all the other things Washington has banned! If you don't like something, pass a law against it, and it magically disappears! That's what Ron Wyden believes, and he doesn't let facts get in the way of what he holds dear and true!

Re:that's gonna totally work!

[houghi]

I would go a step further and make watching it illegal. Imagine the power you have if everybody has a criminal record. :"Hey, we are a democratic republic and everybody can vote, except the people who are criminals. So yea, that is all 7 of them."

Why worry?

[thegarbz]

Fake news and the people who look at it are a self-perpetuating echo chamber. The rise of new ways to create fake news doesn't change the impact or prevalence as those who believe in that garbage don't need some advanced fake video to cement their beliefs. As it is they aren't swayed by logic or reality so why should these videos make the situation any worse?

Just search for youtube conspiracies that that prove the planes hitting the WTC were digital fakes to see what I mean.

This won't change the status quo.

Inevetible: Total Recall predicted this

[kfh227]

This was all inevitable. I knew this would happen ever since I saw Total Recall.

How do you maintain trust?

[SirGarlon]

Sen. Mark Warner, quoted in TFA, said:

"This ultimately begs the question -- how do you maintain trust in a digital-based economy when you may not be able to believe your own eyes anymore?" he asked rhetorically.

Umm, how about digital signatures?

The idea of fake news isn't new. It's been easy to print complete fabrications since Gutenberg. The real problem is uncritical consumption of "information."

Re:Blame the technology

[AmiMoJo]

They've been caught time and again faking on location scenes, reporting entirely unfounded stories which when disproved they are slow to retract, and they bias their stories with a slant to their political ideology.

Don't fall for this. Yes, there are problems, but just because someone publishes a blog "debunking" some story and 8 minutes later it's still up on Reuters even though it's been pointed out that it's FAKE NEWS and an obvious product of Clinton's bought and paid for leftist "journalists" doesn't mean... Well, it doesn't mean shit.

There is fake news, but there is probably even more fake fake news trying to convince you that real news is fake.

Re:Blame the technology

[Tablizer]

The loss of faith in MSM is entirely self inflicted. They've been caught time and again [being manipulative and biased]

This isn't new, it's just that the Internet made it easier to spread the word of their sins. Further, polarization of politics has made each other more likely to point out the others' mistakes. News networks used to rarely trash each other, at least not intensely. Corporations are jerks, gov't agency are jerks, users are jerks, etc. We can't make humans stop sucking, but we need to find a practical way to limit and monitor the suckage.

Perhaps in order for reporters to be granted press access to politicians and press conferences, their sponsoring org has to follow a minimum set of quality and transparency guidelines.

Re:CNN Welcomes it

[Tablizer]

This was debunked somewhere, I just can't find the related links right now. As I remember it, the press was allowed a very limited amount of physical space by cops such that the camera person accidentally ended up in the shot.

Citation needed

[rsilvergun]

I don't recall the last time I saw CNN doing this. Nor the Washington Post or NY Times. Heck, Jon Oliver & the Daily Show are both meticulously researched (as Oliver put it, they have to be or they'd be sued into oblivion by the mega corps they periodically go after).

I suppose you could say that about Fox News. You might even say the same about Politico and Mother Jones. Though those two aren't exactly MSM and Fox News themselves claims to be an entertainment network (that's how they get out of equal time rules and the like). But for most of Main Stream Media there's enough cross checking going on that you don't get too many stories that count as fake.

Simple rule

[fred911]

Believe none of what you hear, half of what you see. Verify everything. Most of the third world already knows this (where they don't expect gruberment to "protect them").