Slew of deepfake video adverts of Sunak on Facebook raises alarm over AI risk to election

More than 100 deepfake video advertisements impersonating Rishi Sunak were paid to be promoted on Facebook in the last month alone, according to research that has raised alarm about the risk AI poses before the general election. The adverts may have reached as many as 400,000 people – despite appearing to break several of Facebook's policies – and mark the first time that the prime minister's image has been doctored in a systematic way en masse. More than 12,929 was spent on 143 adverts, originating from 23 countries including the US, Turkey, Malaysia and the Philippines. They include one with faked footage of a BBC newsreader, Sarah Campbell, appearing to read out breaking news that falsely claims a scandal has erupted around Sunak secretly earning "colossal sums from a project that was initially intended for ordinary citizens". It carries the untrue claim that Elon Musk has launched an application capable of "collecting" stock market transactions and follows with a faked clip of Sunak saying the government had decided to test the application rather than risking the money of ordinary people.