Shockingly Real Tom Cruise Deepfakes Are Invading TikTok. Are Deepfake Videos a Threat to Democracy? Use this lesson plan to help students think deeply about the role of faked and synthetic media in their lives.
Every day, teens engage with countless images and videos that have been edited or digitally altered. From simple Snapchat filters to short, lighthearted, or ironic TikTok videos, it's clear that young people are pretty savvy when it comes to consuming -- and creating -- manipulated media. And in a lot of ways, seeing altered media is just part of being online today. But are your students aware of -- or have they thought deeply about -- disinformation online, including the phenomenon of deepfake videos?
Known more formally as a type of "synthetic media," these altered videos usually show real people doing and saying things they never actually did or said. "Deepfakes are really the latest incarnation of manipulated media. Use this lesson plan to have your students consider questions like: Why are faked images and videos so popular? Recommended for: Prep for teachers In the classroom. Nearly Extinct Pink Dolphin Gives Birth To Pink Calf. We all love dolphins, but most of us didn’t know that they can be even cuter than we know them- when colored pink!
And the good news is that a rare pink dolphin mom, called Pinky, has given birth to a pink calf of her own! She became popular 12 years ago when she was spotted by Captain Erik Rue in the Calcasieu River in Louisiana. He saw her regularly swimming in the area and mating with dolphins, and even depicted her as ‘very sexually active’. The video of Pinky and her baby was posted on Pinky’s Facebook page, by a person named Thomas Adams and shows the pair jumping close to the boat in the Calcasieu Ship Channel. According to experts, Pinky is a rare river dolphin who got the pink color from a rare genetic mutation. The birth of the calf gives us hope that calves have inherited their mother’s genetic mutation which would help in the effort of increasing the population of rare species.
Bridget Boudreaux spotted Pinky and her calf in the river a while ago. Deepfakes Are Coming. We Can No Longer Believe What We See. This viral Schwarzenegger deepfake isn't just entertaining. It's a warning. The video starts like dozens of others on YouTube — with former “Saturday Night Live” star Bill Hader offering up a celebrity impression, this time of Arnold Schwarzenegger.
The impression is spot-on, but that’s not why the video has almost 6 million views in the last month. About ten seconds into the video, Hader’s face slowly, almost imperceptibly starts to morph into Schwarzenegger’s face. The full transformation takes about six seconds, but the changes are so subtle that it seems like magic. Suddenly, it looks like Schwarzenegger, albeit a skinnier version, is doing an impression of himself. The video quickly became one of YouTube’s most watched deepfake videos, a burgeoning genre of content on the internet that uses powerful — and often free — software to create extremely lifelike videos of people saying just about anything.
The emergence of these videos has led to growing concern that they could be used to spread a new, powerful form of misinformation ahead of the 2020 elections. Deepfake Videos And The Threat Of Not Knowing What's Real. It’s November 2020, only days before the presidential election.
Early voting is underway in several states as a video suddenly spreads across social media. One of the candidates has disclosed a dire cancer diagnosis, and is making an urgent plea: “I’m too sick to lead. Please, don’t vote for me.” The video is quickly revealed to be a computer-generated hoax, but the damage is done ― especially as trolls eagerly push the line that the video is actually real, and the candidate has just changed her mind. Such a scenario, while seemingly absurd, would actually be possible to achieve using a “deepfake,” a doctored video in which a person can be made to appear as if they’re doing and saying anything. House lawmakers will convene on Thursday for the first time to discuss the weaponization of deepfakes, and world leaders have begun to take notice.
“People can duplicate me speaking and saying anything. How Deepfakes Are Made It may sound complicated, but it’s rapidly getting easier.