Deepfakes are everywhere. Here's how to spot them

A trickle of AI-fueled misinformation has turned into a powerful stream over the past year, with fake photos and videos--from Donald Trump's and Vladimir Putin's "arrest" to the Pope's "gangsta" outfit--highlighting the scope of the problem. "Deepfake" is an umbrella term for various types of synthetic content, created or altered with the aid of artificial intelligence, which can appear to show events, scenes or conversations that never happened. These types of creations come in a variety of visual, audial, and textual forms and can feature something innocuous, such as Jim Carrey in The Shining, or far more sinister and dangerous--like the fake videos of Joe Biden's "address to the nation," for example. Initially, deepfake technology was largely used to generate pranks and involuntary pornography. Now, it is increasingly deployed as a vehicle for misinformation--scientific, medical, financial, and, perhaps most worryingly, political. Newsweek previously reported on warnings that these technologies already present a real threat and have the potential to upend the democratic process in the 2024 election, with calls growing louder for regulators, big tech, and governments to intervene.