Over 900 researchers, university professors and industry experts, including Yoshua Bengio (considered one of the "fathers" of artificial intelligence), have signed an open letter to ask for regulation against deepfakes, fake videos generated with artificial intelligence .
The case of singer Tylor Swift's deepfake porn has recently hit the news, but fears of misuse are growing in view of the elections which this year will see millions of citizens around the world at the polls.
The letter, titled Disrupting the Deepfake Supply Chain, makes recommendations on how to regulate deepfakes, including full criminalization of child pornography, criminal sanctions for any individual who knowingly creates or facilitates the spread of harmful deepfakes, and calls on AI companies to prevent that their products create malicious deepfakes.
“Unprecedented advances in AI are making the creation of deepfakes fast, cheap and easy. The total number grew 550% from 2019 to 2023 – the signatories write – Deepfake pornography makes up 98% of all deepfake videos online , with 99% of those targeted being women."
Furthermore, the signatories add, "with half the world's population facing elections soon, the widespread creation and proliferation of deepfakes represents a growing threat to democratic processes around the world."
Among the signatories of the letter are Steven Pinker, professor of psychology at Harvard, Joy Buolamwini, founder of the Algorithmic Justice League, two former Estonian presidents and researchers from Google DeepMind and OpenAI.
And there is also Frances Haugen, the former Meta employee who denounced the risks of the platforms for minors.
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