Advanced machine learning technology is used to create fake pornographic videos with real, famous actors and pop stars, "sticking" their faces on top of those of the porn stars starring in these videos.
The result, as reported by the British newspaper The Guardian (hence the above photo composition ", is often very convincing, with very few small details to make the viewer suspect for some technical intervention.
A group of Reddit users has spent months creating and distributing these videos, started by the user under the pseudonym deepfake. They started with videos starring Wonder Woman Gal Gadot, Taylor Swift, Scarlett Johansson and Macy Williams of "Game of Thrones". To date, videos have been added, among others, of Daisy Ridley from "Star Wars", Emma Watson from "Harry Potter" and Sophie Turner from "Game of Thrones". Watch below an excerpt of a few seconds from the video with Gal Gadot in the position of a porn star.
Impressive, right? While a simple "face swap", as it is commonly called, is possible through a bunch of applications that we download to smartphones, the work of deepfake and its imitators is of a much higher level thanks to the advanced artificial intelligence, which "learns" from a bunch of authentic videos of the actors and then matching them properly with those of the porn stars.
In fact, at the end of last December, another user with the nickname deepfakeapp released a computer program that allows anyone to do just that job. Of course, it is not easy to use, and it takes time - a clip of a few seconds needs 8-12 hours of processing. But over time updates will be made and performance will improve.
Naturally, the ease with which these fake pornographic videos are created has raised a great deal of concern about other areas of our lives. We will soon reach a point where we can no longer trust what we see and hear. And if today fake news deceives so many people without "teased" videos, imagine what will happen next…