A deepfake video network is spreading false information about the U.S. trade war: report

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A network that’s likely based outside of Canada is using deepfakes to spread “politically divisive” content to Canadians, says a new report released Thursday.

OTTAWA - A network that’s likely based outside of Canada is using deepfakes to spread “politically divisive” content to Canadians, says a new report released Thursday.

The report from McGill University’s Centre for Media, Technology and Democracy says the network uses deepfakes of real influencers. It combines the faces of real people with fake lip movements and voices generated by AI.

“We do not know what the network is for, but its operators are willing to steal faces and spread falsehoods that set Canadians against the United States, against their own government and against each other,” the report says.

Using footage of real people likely keeps the videos from being flagged as AI, the report says, noting that TikTok has only labelled four per cent of such videos as AI.

It says many of the videos focus on the U.S.-Canada trade war and the most-watched videos include false information.

They include a video about a non-existent 48-hour ultimatum from U.S. President Donald Trump which falsely says Prime Minister Mark Carney responded by cancelling $8 billion in U.S. defence contracts.

“This never happened, but the story was shared in 161 videos on 129 accounts and played 5.1 million times,” the report says.

The people who comment on the videos don’t seem to realize they are fake, with only 6.3 per cent saying the video is inauthentic or propaganda.

“The rest agree or argue with the content in the video, and one in ten speaks to the narrator as a real person: thanking them, praising them, or telling them to check their facts,” the report says.

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