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The danger of deepfakes is not what you think
Instead of wreaking political damage, AI-generated content can be useful for election campaigns.
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The concern now is that the power of AI might industrialise disinformation, says the writer.
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John Thornhill
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One of our shoutiest moral panics these days is the fear that AI-enabled deepfakes will degrade democracy. Half of the world’s population are voting in 70 countries in 2024. Some 1,500 experts polled by the World Economic Forum in late 2023 reckoned that misinformation and disinformation were the most severe global risks over the next two years. Even extreme weather risks and interstate armed conflict were seen as less threatening.
But, type it gently, their concerns appear overblown. Not for the first time, the Davos consensus might be wrong.
