Dear Subscribers,
In this post we want to share an interactive podcast and an insightful article which we curated on Medium and Substack for your information.
The story is titled Why Deep Fakes Stop Thought Leaders Like Me from Creating YouTube Videos
Here is the link to the interactive podcast about deep fakes:
Why Deepfakes Are So Dangerous and What We Can Do to Lower Risks
Here is the transcript if you don’t have access to podcast:
Here is your podcast transcript reformatting with the times removed and using “Speaker 1” and “Speaker 2”:
Speaker 1:
Ever catch yourself watching a video online and thinking, hold on, is this thing for real? I mean, it’s getting tougher to tell these days, right? Especially with all the talk about deep fakes.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, no doubt. It’s like the line between real and fake is getting blurrier by the minute. Used to be we’d say a picture’s worth a thousand words, but now even videos can’t be trusted.
Speaker 1:
So before we get into the really complicated stuff, could you give us a quick refresher on deep fakes? I feel like I’ve heard the term, but…
Speaker 2:
Picture this.
Speaker 1:
Hmm.
Speaker 2:
There’s a video of you online saying or doing something you would never even dream of, and it’s spreading like wildfire. That’s the kind of scary thing we’re talking about with deepfakes. They’re basically like, imagine AI creating synthetic media—videos, audio, you name it—that looks incredibly real, but it’s totally made up.
Speaker 1:
And it’s not just celebrities or politicians they’re going after anymore, huh?
Speaker 2:
Exactly. There’s actually this case that really got me thinking, one that shows just how serious this whole deepfake thing is. It involves a health care professional, Mike, broadly.
Speaker 1:
Health care? Whoa, hadn’t even thought about that. What went down?
Speaker 2:
Okay, so put yourself in this situation. You’re online doing some research about a medical treatment, and you stumble across a video. The doctor in the video, you recognize him from a news segment. He’s recommending a particular medication. You’d probably trust his expertise, right?
Speaker 1:
For sure, especially if it’s about my health.
Speaker 2:
But hold on. What if that video is a deepfake? See, in Brodley’s case, someone took his image and the images of some other well-known doctors and used them to create these deepfake videos promoting treatments and medications that were totally unverified.
Speaker 1:
Man, that’s messed up. People are making life or death decisions based on this kind of medical advice.
Speaker 2:
That’s the whole point. This case really highlights how deepfakes can be used to take advantage of our trust in authority figures, even in areas like health care, where accuracy is so important.
Speaker 1:
It’s like this whole other level of deception. So how do we protect ourselves, especially if these fakes are getting harder to spot?
Speaker 2:
That’s where someone like Dr. Mehmet Yildiz comes in. He’s a cognitive scientist and technologist, been in the field for over 40 years, and he’s been ringing the alarm bells about deep fakes for a while now. The ironic thing is he tries to stay away from being online as much as possible.
Speaker 1:
Wait, he’s worried about being online. That’s kind of ironic, don’t you think? A tech expert avoiding tech.
Speaker 2:
Right. You’d think he’d be all over it. But Dr. Yildiz actually argues that platforms like YouTube, where videos can blow up overnight, are like breeding grounds for deepfakes. He even refuses to use YouTube because of this.
Speaker 1:
So he’s basically saying that nobody’s safe in this digital age, not even the experts.
Speaker 2:
Exactly. It’s not even about being good with technology. It’s about the fact that deepfakes completely erode our trust. Think about it. Dr. Yildiz has built his entire career on his credibility, on people trusting him. Now imagine some deep fake pops up of him promoting some shady product or spouting off some controversial opinions that he doesn’t actually believe.
Speaker 1:
His reputation would be toast and who knows how many people would be misled in the process.
Speaker 2:
And that’s just one example. The potential for damage is huge.
Speaker 1:
It’s about protecting yourself, right? Like the less there is of you out there in the digital world, the less material someone has to create a deep fake.
Speaker 2:
Right. Like Dr. Yildiz suggests being really careful about what you post online, especially when it comes to photos and videos. But he knows, we all know, that even if we’re super careful, we can still end up victims of this stuff. So what happens if you come across a deep fake? Let’s say you find one of yourself online.
Speaker 1:
Wouldn’t want to just ignore it, would we?
Speaker 2:
Definitely not. Dr. Yildiz is all about taking action. If you see a deep fake, whether it’s you or someone else, you got to report it, report it to whatever platform you found it on. And especially if you think someone’s using it to do something bad, you know, like a scam or spreading misinformation, stuff like that, then it’s time to get the authorities involved.
Speaker 1:
So report it. And if you need to get the experts in on it, don’t just let it slide. OK, what about being proactive? Anything we can do to stop this before it even happens?
Speaker 2:
Actually, there are some things you can do, which is pretty cool. Dr. Yildiz talks about this thing called authenticating content, like putting your own digital signature on the stuff you post online.
Speaker 1:
You mean like adding watermarks to photos or using those digital signatures you were talking about?
Speaker 2:
You got it. It even goes beyond that, though. He mentioned something called blockchain verification as a way to create like a record of your content that can’t be messed with.
Speaker 1:
OK, you lost me a little bit there. Blockchain verification. How does that work with all of this?
Speaker 2:
OK, so you know how people are always saying blockchain is this super secure way to track things. It’s like a digital ledger. Well, imagine you could take your photos and videos and attach a unique blockchain identifier to them. Then if someone tries to make a deep fake using that content, the blockchain record would immediately show that the original was altered.
Speaker 1:
So it’s like what, giving your content its own little digital fingerprint that can’t be copied?
Speaker 2:
That’s the idea. It’s like this invisible seal of authenticity that follows your content wherever it goes. It’s still pretty new technology, but Dr. Yildiz seems to think it could be a game changer.
Speaker 1:
Interesting stuff. But he’s also not saying technology is the whole answer, is he?
Speaker 2:
Right. He talks a lot about the human side of things, about teaching people about deep fakes, especially people who might be more likely to fall for them, you know?
Speaker 1:
Like having that awkward conversation with your grandma about how to spot a fake video.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, exactly. We need to be having these conversations with our families and friends. The more aware we are as a society, the less likely we are to be fooled. He actually compares it to those see something, say something campaigns. We’ve got to bring that same energy to the digital world.
Speaker 1:
And part of that means working with the good guys, right? I mean, the folks creating those anti-deep fake tools.
Speaker 2:
Absolutely. And the cool thing is there are more and more of these tools being developed all the time. Some of them use AI to analyze videos, looking for signs of manipulation, like those tiny glitches we talked about that are almost impossible to see with the naked eye. Others are trying to find ways to prove where content came from, like tracing it back to the actual camera that recorded it.
Speaker 1:
It’s like a technological arms race. Good AI versus bad AI.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, kind of. Dr. Yildiz really wants people to learn about these tools and use them to check out content before they share it or believe anything they see.
Speaker 1:
So basically, don’t check your skepticism at the digital door.
Speaker 2:
Absolutely. Don’t just assume everything you see and hear online is true, especially if it seems really over the top. There’s a good chance it might be fake.
Speaker 1:
It’s almost like we have to up our security game in every area of our lives now to stay one step ahead of the bad guys.
Speaker 2:
100%.
Speaker 1:
And if you want to know what Dr. Yieldis thinks is most important, it’s staying informed. So read about the latest developments in deep fakes, talk about it with people, that kind of thing.
Speaker 2:
You got it. The more we know about how these deep fakes work and the tricks people use to make them… the better we’ll be at spotting them. Like they say, knowledge is power.
Speaker 1:
Right. And speaking of knowledge, there was this one thing on Dr. Yuldas’s list that I found super interesting. He talks about this idea of maintaining transparency.
Speaker 2:
What does that even look like in a world where everyone is worried about being deep faked? Maintaining transparency seems like you’d want to do the opposite, right? If everyone’s worried about being faked, wouldn’t you want to, you
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