Deepfake Maps Could Really Confuse the Sense of the World

Showing satellite images The expansion of large detention camps in Xinjiang (China) between 2016 and 2018 provided some of the strongest evidence for a government repression to more than a million Muslims, leading to international condemnation and sanctions.

Other aerial images — such as Iran’s nuclear facilities and North Korean missile sites — have had a similar impact on world events. Now, image manipulation tools have made it possible Artificial intelligence it may be more difficult to accept such images at face value.

In a paper published online last month, he is a professor at the University of Washington Bo Zhao they used similar AI techniques used to create the so-called deepfakes to change satellite images of different cities. Zhao and colleagues changed the features of the images between Seattle and Beijing to show buildings that do not have Seattle buildings and to remove structures and replace them with Beijing greenery.

Zhaok used it on algorithm call CycleGAN to manipulate satellite photos. The algorithm developed by UC Berkeley researchers has been widely used for all types of image fraud. Artificial training neural network know the key features of certain images, such as the style of painting or the characteristics of a particular type of map. Another algorithm then helps to improve the performance of the former by trying to detect when an image is manipulated.

As with in-depth video clips that are intended to show people in a dangerous situation, these images can be misleading by the government or spread on social media, sowing misinformation or doubts about visual information.

“I absolutely believe that this is a serious problem that will not affect the average citizen of tomorrow, but will have a much bigger role behind it in the next decade,” he says. Grant McKenzie, an assistant professor of space data science at McGill University in Canada, and did not associate it with work.

“Imagine a world where a state government or other actor can manipulate images in a real way to show nothing there or to show a different design,” says McKenzie. “I’m not entirely sure what can be done to stop this moment.”

Some images manipulated in a crude way by satellite have already spread virally on social media, among others photo it was apparently hand-touched that he wanted to illuminate India during the Hindu festival of Diwali. It may be time consuming to use much more sophisticated satellite “deep images” such as hiding weapons facilities or misjustifying military actions.

Gabrielle Lim, a researcher at Harvard Kennedy School’s Shorenstein Center that focuses on media manipulation, says that maps can be used to deceive without AI. It points images circulated on the network suggesting that Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez was not at the place where she said she was in the Capitol Uprising on January 6, as well as Chinese passports. shows a region under discussion The South China Sea as part of China. “There’s no elegant technology, but it can achieve similar goals,” Lime says.