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AI Politics

A Russian Propaganda Network Is Promoting an AI-Manipulated Biden Video (wired.com) 224

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Wired: In recent weeks, as so-called cheap fake video clips suggesting President Joe Biden is unfit for office have gone viral on social media, a Kremlin-affiliated disinformation network has been promoting a parody music video featuring Biden wearing a diaper and being pushed around in a wheelchair. The video is called "Bye, Bye Biden" and has been viewed more than 5 million times on X since it was first promoted in the middle of May. It depicts Biden as senile, wearing a hearing aid, and taking a lot of medication. It also shows him giving money to a character who seems to represent illegal migrants while denying money to US citizens until they change their costume to mimic the Ukrainian flag. Another scene shows Biden opening the front door of a family home that features a Confederate flag on the wall and allowing migrants to come in and take over. Finally, the video contains references to stolen election conspiracies pushed by former president Donald Trump.

The video was created by Little Bug, a group that mimics the style of Little Big, a real Russian band that fled the country in 2022 following Russia's invasion of Ukraine. The video features several Moscow-based actors -- who spoke with Russian media outlet Agency.Media -- but also appears to use artificial intelligence technology to make the actors resemble Biden and Trump, as well as Ilya Prusikin, the lead singer of Little Big. "Biden and Trump appear to be the same actor, with deepfake video-editing changing his facial features until he resembles Biden in one case and Trump in the other case," says Alex Fink, an AI and machine-vision expert who analyzed the video for WIRED. "The editing is inconsistent, so you can see that in some cases he resembles Biden more and in others less. The facial features keep changing." An analysis by True Media, a nonprofit that was founded to tackle the spread of election-related deepfakes, found with 100 percent confidence that there was AI-generated audio used in the video. It also assessed with 78 percent confidence that some AI technology was used to manipulate the faces of the actors.

Fink says the obvious nature of the deepfake technology on display here suggests that the video was created in a rush, using a small number of iterations of a generative adversarial network in order to create the characters of Biden and Trump. It is unclear who is behind the video, but "Bye, Bye Biden" has been promoted by the Kremlin-aligned network known as Doppelganger. The campaign posted tens of thousands of times on X and was uncovered by Antibot4Navalny, an anonymous collective of Russian researchers who have been tracking Doppelganger's activity for the past six months. The campaign first began on May 21, and there have been almost 4,000 posts on X promoting the video in 13 languages that were promoted by a network of almost 25,000 accounts. The Antibot4Navalny researchers concluded that the posts were written with the help of generative AI technology. The video has been shared 6.5 million times on X and has been viewed almost 5 million times.

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A Russian Propaganda Network Is Promoting an AI-Manipulated Biden Video

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  • Than again so is Trump our choces are so grand this time.
  • so over the top that it becomes a spoof comedy. I really hope they keep making these.
    • There are tens of millions of baby boomers out there whose brains don't work anymore but who still vote. Age-related cognitive decline is a thing. You mix it with low information voting and you have a powerfully dangerous cocktail.

      Vladimir Putin isn't good at running countries, he's a terrible military leader, a shitty politician and an absolute psychopath.

      But none of that is his specialty. His specialty was is and always will be information warfare. He's ex Soviet KGB. One of the old school scary c
      • by WaffleMonster ( 969671 ) on Wednesday June 26, 2024 @11:05PM (#64581343)

        Vladimir Putin isn't good at running countries, he's a terrible military leader, a shitty politician and an absolute psychopath.

        But none of that is his specialty. His specialty was is and always will be information warfare. He's ex Soviet KGB. One of the old school scary comrade types.

        After watching Tucker's train-wreck interview I very much doubt even that is true. When given the chance to speak to a western audience Putler blew it on warped history lessons nobody gave two shits about. It showed someone consumed by their own bullshit and comically unaware of their audience.

      • Putin was an assassin at one point in his KGB career, which, I believe, is one reason why he is more likely to have people who don't fall in line with his thoughts killed.

        But I am a boomer, so maybe I am talking about my cocoa I drank this morning.

    • It was inspired by an original video featuring the likeness of Vladimir Putin; but that video's creator committed suicide by being pushed out a closed window after being hit in the head with a hammer.

    • by migos ( 10321981 )
      You have no idea how dumb TikTok users are
  • It's a ripoff of this video was posted 2 years ago: https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]

    Here's the new one now with cheapfakes: https://vk.com/video-221265170... [vk.com]

  • by rsilvergun ( 571051 ) on Wednesday June 26, 2024 @07:33PM (#64581025)
    Is that Vladimir Putin, a brutal dictator who started an unprovoked war with the nation that gave up its nuclear arms, wants Donald Trump to win.

    I know damn well there's a bunch of trumpers on this forum and I know they tend to keep quiet about it. They don't like the looks they get when they're wearing the red hat which is hilarious because they're the first ones to tell you microaggressions aren't real....

    But bottom line Putin is ex Soviet KGB. And Putin gets along great with Donald Trump. So if you're one of those trumpers congratulations, you became a Soviet style communist to stick it to the libs.

    Was it worth it?
  • I tell you, kids these days got 0 pride in their propaganda work.
  • Otherwise, there is no way this could be real [imgur.com].

  • So, its AI when "the good guys" use it and its "a generative adversarial network" when "bad guys" use it?

    Even the summary is propaganda.

    • The sky is falling generates more news clicks. The corporate media is losing respect because viewers are getting exhausted by this sort of baiting. Satire is satire, doesn't generate the same traction that them bad Russians are trying to sway elections by making videos of Biden!! does.

  • It wouldnt be a threat if people were capable of thinking for themselves, willing to analyze the data, and make an informed decision rather than jump to a forgone conclusion.
    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      Who says they're not? It's an obvious spoof video.

      It never ceases to amaze me how many here cry like little bitches about my name then turn around and think exactly like that about other people.

      The irony on this site is so thick you need a blow torch to cut it.

  • Why should any self-respecting person give money to someone with no morals?
  • ..then that tells you all you need to know, doesn't it? Russia loves a convicted felon. Don't vote for a convicted felon and traitor like Trump.

All science is either physics or stamp collecting. -- Ernest Rutherford

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