Celebrity deepfakes springing up on the web, and even in advertising, are raising concerns. The technology is advancing in sophistication and commercial interest. Apple was just granted rights by the U.S. Patent Office to “face image generation with pose and expression control” from reference images. This month, video of President Biden was manipulated into a performance of the viral children’s tune “Baby Shark,” while a digital doppelganger for Elon Musk hawked investment opportunities for real estate startup reAlpha Tech. Tom Cruise, Leonardo DiCaprio and Bruce Willis are also among those artificially misappropriated for promotional use without permission. Continue reading Deepfakes Used for Entertainment, Advertising Draw Concern

Spotify will acquire London-based startup Sonantic, a company that creates realistic human voices from text using a proprietary AI engine. Sonantic made a recent high-profile contribution to pop culture by providing the means to simulate actor Val Kilmer’s voice in Paramount’s summer blockbuster “Top Gun: Maverick.” The move expands the music and podcasting streamer to expand into audio technology with broad implications. Spotify vice president of personalization Ziad Sultan says the technology will be integrated into the main platform to allow the company “to engage users in a new and even more personalized way.” Continue reading Spotify Announces Plan to Acquire AI Voice Startup Sonantic

Deepfakes, in which a person in a video is swapped for another person via AI-enabled tools, are on the rise. Deeptrace reported that, between October 2019 and June 2020, the number of deepfakes on the Internet jumped 330 percent, reaching 50,000 at the peak. Deepfakes have been used to place celebrities in embarrassing and inappropriate content, defraud a major energy producer and many other disruptive or criminal uses. Tools to create deepfakes are readily available, and a recent study said deepfakes can reliably fool commercial facial recognition services. Continue reading Study Suggests Deepfakes Fool Top Facial Recognition Tech