back to article There's a scarily good 'deepfakes' YouTube channel that's quietly growing – and it's freaking everyone out

“Do not believe what you see on the internet, OK?” a techie, who doctors video clips apparently using AI algorithms and puts them on YouTube, has warned. The resulting digitally altered material ranges from a comedian doing impersonations of celebrities, with the performer's face changed to match those of the stars being …

  1. Notas Badoff

    Now that's not SciFi...

    but it was predicted by SciFi decades ago. That racist/elitist sound bite - you going to believe that? That gotcha video - you going to believe that? They could all have been faked.

    The one thing that can't be faked is who a person is - what someone has actually done over time. Do they have values you can respect? Knowledge you can rely on? Moral stamina you can trust? Do you know that politician / public figure, or are you being swayed by the latest short-term bullshit storm?

    What I'd really like to see is people stop saying "the bad guys fooled us" and realize the real problem is they let themselves be fooled.

    1. Anonymous South African Coward Bronze badge

      Re: Now that's not SciFi...

      Wizard's First Rule.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        One who believes that belief is not strictly voluntary is already engaging in voluntary and perhaps recursive self-deception.

      2. CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

        Re: Now that's not SciFi...

        Wizard's First Rule.

        Always make sure there is at least one tank between you and the big scary thing with far too many teeth for comfort?

        Always make sure that you have a teleport/Dimension door spell in reserve for when the tanks become ugly-monster fodder?

        Never, ever, ever trust a dwarf?

        Those are (at various times) my wizards first rules..

    2. Mike Timbers

      Re: Now that's not SciFi...

      But how do you know who a person is? Because you research on the web? 1984's Ministry of Truth proves that if you can amend the supposedly trusted data (including the wayback machine), then you will only ever know who they want you to think the person "is".

      1. Claptrap314 Silver badge

        Re: Now that's not SciFi...

        This. One of my favorite quotes by Thomas Jefferson is along these lines. Pull from https://quoteinvestigator.com/2016/12/03/misinformed/

        "Nothing can now be believed which is seen in a newspaper. Truth itself becomes suspicious by being put into that polluted vehicle. The real extent of this state of misinformation is known only to those who are in situations to confront facts within their knowledge with the lies of the day"

        And

        "I will add, that the man who never looks into a newspaper is better informed than he who reads them; inasmuch as he who knows nothing is nearer to truth than he whose mind is filled with falsehoods & errors. He who reads nothing will still learn the great facts, and the details are all false."

        What you yourself do not observe must be judged careful. Doubly so what you do yourself observe.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          I thought the random line was "believe half of what you see and even less of what you hear [about]"...

  2. Frumious Bandersnatch

    Infernal Affairs

    Or rather the US remake (The Departed). I just couldn't understand the casting. Di Caprio and Damon just have those kinds of faces that make it too difficult for me to distinguish between them. Though maybe it's just me. Just the other week, I mistook my wife for a hat.

    1. Frumious Bandersnatch

      Re: Infernal Affairs

      And don't get me started on "Heat"

      1. CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

        Re: Infernal Affairs

        And don't get me started on "Heat"

        Heat don't move from the cooler to the hotter,

        You can try it if you like but you'd far better notter..

        That sort of heat?

        (Flanders and Swann - truely amazing 1960's music hall.)

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Infernal Affairs

      An attempt at humour, one supposes?

    3. Mike Green

      Re: Infernal Affairs

      Upvote for the "Man who though his wife was a hat" reference.

  3. JLV

    BBC had a recent article on how John Brunner was one of the best predictive SF writers ever. Not sure if its in Sheep Look Up or Stand on Zanzibar, but this stuff reminds of a bit where some politician or other is shown doing something in a video.

    To which the narrative adds that, of course, a properly funded fake campaign could simulate said politician perfectly, down to individual pubic hairs. For something written 50 yrs ago, not too shabby. Too bad global warming wasn’t really a thing back then, he’d have had a field day.

    http://www.bbc.com/culture/story/20190509-the-1968-sci-fi-that-spookily-predicted-today

    1. myhandler

      Brunner also predicted mass migration of the desperate poor trying to get in to Europe from Africa - I can't reclal which of those two it was in either!

      1. Charles 9

        Given the topic was overpopulation, likely Stand on Zanzibar. The Sheep Look Up was more about the environment.

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    I'll be baaaaack

    So, can someone remake the Terminator films with a real actor but with Arnold Schwarzenegger''s face?

    1. John Miles
      Joke

      Re: I'll be baaaaack

      It wouldn't be so life like then - after all the Terminator is a robot

    2. Aristotles slow and dimwitted horse

      Re: I'll be baaaaack

      I think you've missed the entire point of his character in those movies.

    3. MRC1980

      Re: I'll be baaaaack

      Isn't this a plot point in "The Last Action Hero"?

      Kid goes to a video store to show Arnie's Character that he was in the Terminator but it's SS in the Standee at the video store.

  5. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Waiting for the deepfake of His Trumpness.

    1. Semtex451

      I thought this was good enough:

      https://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/12/17/scientific_reports_paper_trump_poo/

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      I thought Trump was a deepfake already, to make the president of the USA look like a pea-brained moron...

  6. Kane
    Terminator

    Interesting channel

    This one came up in my recommendation list the other day, watched the Arnie impression clip and subbed to the channel. After watching all the clips, quite rightly impressed with the results.

    Hilariously, someone in the comments of one of the Fight Club clips suggested that they do a face swap of Nicolas Cage and John Travolta in Face/Off.

    1. Anonymous South African Coward Bronze badge

      Re: Interesting channel

      Hilariously, someone in the comments of one of the Fight Club clips suggested that they do a face swap of Nicolas Cage and John Travolta in Face/Off.

      ROFL

      For real? Or was it somebody taking the piss?

      1. Anonymous Coward
  7. Drew Scriver

    Deepfake's Impact cannot be overstated...

    If Deepfake lives up to its potential:

    - No video can be trusted, whether it's in news reports, court proceedings, or police investigations.

    - Political campaign videos showing the opponent making outrageous claims can be trusted.

    - Historical videos cannot be trusted any longer.

    On a positive note, bad movie acting can be eradicated in the editing phase. :-)

    1. Francis Boyle Silver badge

      The sky is not falling

      It's just means that videos of unknown provenance can't be trusted (as has be the case with photographs for years now) so no one will believe the pee-pee tape when Putin finally releases it.

      1. Mike Timbers

        Re: The sky is not falling

        On the contrary. Everyone who was already inclined to believe <insert apparent fact> will believe it. All those who were not inclined, won't.

        We live in a world of "alternate facts" where societies are so divided that provenance is assumed so long as it reinforces the watcher's world view. Any that contradict their worldview will be written off as deep fakes.

        "Proof" will no longer exist or matter.

        1. Francis Boyle Silver badge

          Re: The sky is not falling

          Well, I was being a tad sarcastic there. Of course, people will believe the pee-pee tape if it surfaces. Or not according to their pre-existing beliefs. (I don't count myself as an exception to that.) And yes, there's a growing contempt for facts in politics. But a commitment to facts has never been about believing photographs. The camera doesn't lie but it always deceives – it has always been potentially a tool of of propaganda. So really we have lost nothing.

    2. TimeMaster T

      Plausible deniability

      "reasonable doubt" is now a certainty in any case in criminal cases where the primary evidence is pictures/videos, unless other irrefutable evidence is presented that substantiates the charges .a lot of criminals may go free.

      But the worst part to me, is a lot of innocent people are going to get their reputations dragged into the mud or worse because of this.

      Pandora's box has been opened, this technology is here and we will have to adapt to it.

    3. Brewster's Angle Grinder Silver badge

      Re: Deepfake's Impact cannot be overstated...

      I'm sure detailed forensic analysis will be able to separate the two. And I suspect that that will always be the case. For example, the AI is unlikely to be be trained on the particular cameras that shot the scene so the noise patterns probably won't match.

      1. Tom Chiverton 1

        Re: Deepfake's Impact cannot be overstated...

        Ah. So you can tell it's fake because of the pixels?

        #oldMeme

        1. bpfh

          Re: Deepfake's Impact cannot be overstated...

          It’s an old meme but it checks out.

          There is already a technology out , called “Titanium”, (IIRC) that detects incoherencies in static images, such as lighting problems and jpeg compression artifacts, and was used on the Obama war room photo when they got Bin Laden, showing the realistic photo, then the elements that had been touched, showing that changes had been made to documents (to blur them), one of the medals on one of the chiefs of staff and some other stuff that was on the raw original photo.

          I guess an evolution on this will be on videos, ringing up face tracking errors or lighting strangeness and in general, flag up suspect videos, though Titanium is a for cost product... and no idea if anything like this exists for video.

      2. DrBed

        Re: Deepfake's Impact cannot be overstated...

        I'm sure detailed forensic analysis will be able to separate the two. And I suspect that that will always be the case.

        Forensic analysis depends of - guess what? Software. Basically, you are claiming that software could not swindle another software.

        For example, the AI is unlikely to be be trained on the particular cameras that shot the scene so the noise patterns probably won't match.

        It just depends of number of shots for fabricating. If source is big enough, AI will make it right ("deep learning"). Beside, there is always human hand here, to improve results. Look at Kasumi's work:

        https://youtu.be/VS-cUrKL1Mg

        (^ It is not a photo, it is drawing!)

        Btw: what about cameras that are already hacked, "thinking" that they are recording live material, but instead "recording" already mastered video?

      3. Kiwi

        Re: Deepfake's Impact cannot be overstated...

        For example, the AI is unlikely to be be trained on the particular cameras that shot the scene so the noise patterns probably won't match.

        Pretty sure that could be fixed or faked as well. If I have a "security camera feed" of a "crime" being committed, and several good quality (very low or no "noise") pictures of the person I want in the footage, I can eliminate the noise from the source material for the fake stuff (especially if it's from multiple cameras) and overlay the expected noise from the "security camera".

        Or, I could add noise to the "security camera" feed and combine the two lots, so you get a noisier feed but any anomalies are easier to explain away. And if I can fool the original recorder into believing it's recording a feed from a camera instead of something manipulated, then the final quality is even more likely to fool software or wetware.

    4. Kiwi
      Holmes

      Re: Deepfake's Impact cannot be overstated...

      - No video can be trusted, whether it's in news reports, court proceedings, or police investigations.

      pretty sure we're well past that point already. Especially WRT the news media and the pigs.

  8. JoMe

    Ctrl WHAT face?

    Am I the only one that read it as Ctrl Sh*t Face??

  9. adam 40 Silver badge
    Paris Hilton

    This is going to be so good for Pr0n...

    Where do I get the software and how much CPU do I need???

    Alexa, re-order tissues.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: This is going to be so good for Pr0n...

      Aw, go on, order a towel.

      1. Kane
        Alien

        Re: This is going to be so good for Pr0n...

        Listen, it's a tough universe. All sorts of people trying to kill you, rip you off, everything. If you're going to survive out there, you've really got to know where your towel is.

    2. phuzz Silver badge
      IT Angle

      Re: This is going to be so good for Pr0n...

      "Where do I get the software and how much CPU do I need???"

      There's various different suites of software, but just google "how to make deepfakes" and that should get you started.

      As for resources, GPUs work better, and nVidia ones seem to be better supported, and on a mid-range graphics card you're looking at hours rather than days to process.

      If you just want to watch it, there's various sites dedicated to deepfakes pr0n. Erm, or so I've been told...

  10. Jock in a Frock

    Uncanny Valley

    Brad Pitt looks dead behind the eyes in that Fight Club clip.

    So I for one think this technology has been perfected.

  11. anonymous boring coward Silver badge

    Does this mean that the US president Trump is actually sane, and all those weird videos of him acting like a total imbecile are fake?

    1. bpfh
      Pint

      Yep

      This is what the Russians did, and the Muller report discovered but the lizard people and the grey aliens of the new world illuminati order managed to quash the truth to ensure the world believes he is an incompetent fool as opposed to the Mensa candidate and Nobel prize winner he actually is.

      The truth is out there, people.

      Ok, I’ll put more water in my whiskey next time. Cheers!

      1. A.P. Veening Silver badge

        Re: Yep

        Ok, I’ll put more water in my whiskey next time.

        Sacrilege, blasphemy and alcohol abuse.

  12. Kiwi
    Trollface

    Time for a crime spree...

    I get the feeling that Chump, Zuck and Gates are about to go on a crime rampage through NZ while also acting out many very hard-core gay sex fantasies in public places.

    If only I knew how to hack into the security camera systems... Or where I could get 10,000,000,000 gallons of orange paint from...

    Is the software capable of shrinking hands to childlike proportions or is that asking too much?

  13. John H Woods Silver badge

    Could be a useful diagnostic for prosopagnosia...

    ... I can't even see the faces changing ... not easily, at any rate.

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