XPost: alt.fan.rush-limbaugh, talk.politics.misc, alt.censorship   
   XPost: comp.ai.philosophy   
   From: d@ray   
      
   THE UNITED STATES’ secretive Special Operations Command is looking for   
   companies to help create deepfake internet users so convincing that neither   
   humans nor computers will be able to detect they are fake, according to a   
   procurement document reviewed by The Intercept.   
      
   The plan, mentioned in a new 76-page wish list by the Department of   
   Defense’s Joint Special Operations Command, or JSOC, outlines advanced   
   technologies desired for country’s most elite, clandestine military   
   efforts. “Special Operations Forces (SOF) are interested in technologies   
   that can generate convincing online personas for use on social media   
   platforms, social networking sites, and other online content,” the entry   
   reads.   
      
   The document specifies that JSOC wants the ability to create online user   
   profiles that “appear to be a unique individual that is recognizable as   
   human but does not exist in the real world,” with each featuring “multiple   
   expressions” and “Government Identification quality photos.”   
      
   In addition to still images of faked people, the document notes that “the   
   solution should include facial & background imagery, facial & background   
   video, and audio layers,” and JSOC hopes to be able to generate “selfie   
   video” from these fabricated humans. These videos will feature more than   
   fake people: Each deepfake selfie will come with a matching faked   
   background, “to create a virtual environment undetectable by social media   
   algorithms.”   
      
   The Pentagon has already been caught using phony social media users to   
   further its interests in recent years. In 2022, Meta and Twitter removed a   
   propaganda network using faked accounts operated by U.S. Central Command,   
   including some with profile pictures generated with methods similar to   
   those outlined by JSOC. A 2024 Reuters investigation revealed a Special   
   Operations Command campaign using fake social media users aimed at   
   undermining foreign confidence in China’s Covid vaccine.   
      
   Last year, Special Operations Command, or SOCOM, expressed interest in   
   using video “deepfakes,” a general term for synthesized audiovisual data   
   meant to be indistinguishable from a genuine recording, for “influence   
   operations, digital deception, communication disruption, and disinformation   
   campaigns.” Such imagery is generated using a variety of machine learning   
   techniques, generally using software that has been “trained” to recognize   
   and recreate human features by analyzing a massive database of faces and   
   bodies. This year’s SOCOM wish list specifies an interest in software   
   similar to StyleGAN, a tool released by Nvidia in 2019 that powered the   
   globally popular website “This Person Does Not Exist.” Within a year of   
   StyleGAN’s launch, Facebook said it had taken down a network of accounts   
   that used the technology to create false profile pictures. Since then,   
   academic and private sector researchers have been engaged in a race between   
   new ways to create undetectable deepfakes, and new ways to detect them.   
   Many government services now require so-called liveness detection to thwart   
   deepfaked identity photos, asking human applicants to upload a selfie video   
   to demonstrate they are a real person — an obstacle that SOCOM may be   
   interested in thwarting.   
      
   The listing notes that special operations troops “will use this capability   
   to gather information from public online forums,” with no further   
   explanation of how these artificial internet users will be used.   
      
   This more detailed procurement listing shows that the United States pursues   
   the exact same technologies and techniques it condemns in the hands of   
   geopolitical foes. National security officials have long described the   
   state-backed use of deepfakes as an urgent threat — that is, if they are   
   being done by another country.   
      
   Last September, a joint statement by the NSA, FBI, and CISA warned   
   “synthetic media, such as deepfakes, present a growing challenge for all   
   users of modern technology and communications.” It described the global   
   proliferation of deepfake technology as a “top risk” for 2023. In a   
   background briefing to reporters this year, U.S. intelligence officials   
   cautioned that the ability of foreign adversaries to disseminate   
   “AI-generated content” without being detected — exactly the capability   
   the   
   Pentagon now seeks — represents a “malign influence accelerant” from the   
   likes of Russia, China, and Iran. Earlier this year, the Pentagon’s Defense   
   Innovation Unit sought private sector help in combating deepfakes with an   
   air of alarm: “This technology is increasingly common and credible, posing   
   a significant threat to the Department of Defense, especially as U.S.   
   adversaries use deepfakes for deception, fraud, disinformation, and other   
   malicious activities.” An April paper by the U.S. Army’s Strategic Studies   
   Institute was similarly concerned: “Experts expect the malicious use of AI,   
   including the creation of deepfake videos to sow disinformation to polarize   
   societies and deepen grievances, to grow over the next decade.”   
      
   The offensive use of this technology by the U.S. would, naturally, spur its   
   proliferation and normalize it as a tool for all governments. “What’s   
   notable about this technology is that it is purely of a deceptive nature,”   
   said Heidy Khlaaf, chief AI scientist at the AI Now Institute. “There are   
   no legitimate use cases besides deception, and it is concerning to see the   
   U.S. military lean into a use of a technology they have themselves warned   
   against. This will only embolden other militaries or adversaries to do the   
   same, leading to a society where it is increasingly difficult to ascertain   
   truth from fiction and muddling the geopolitical sphere.”   
      
   Both Russia and China have been caught using deepfaked video and user   
   avatars in their online propaganda efforts, prompting the State Department   
   to announce an international “Framework to Counter Foreign State   
   Information Manipulation” in January. “Foreign information manipulation and   
   interference is a national security threat to the United States as well as   
   to its allies and partners,” a State Department press release said.   
   “Authoritarian governments use information manipulation to shred the fabric   
   of free and democratic societies.”   
      
   SOCOM’s interest in deepfakes is part of a fundamental tension within the   
   U.S. government, said Daniel Byman, a professor of security studies at   
   Georgetown University and a member of the State Department’s International   
   Security Advisory Board. “Much of the U.S. government has a strong interest   
      
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