New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday flagged the issue of misuse of Artificial Intelligence (AI) for making deepfake videos and alerted everyone about the looming threat.
PM Modi addressed the deepfake videos issue, while speaking to journalists at BJP’s Diwali Milan programme at the party’s headquarters in the national capital.
While listing out the challenges, he also mentioned about his own deepfake video doing the rounds.
‘I watched my deep fake video in which I’m doing garba,” the prime minister said
“But the reality is that I have not done garba after my school life. Someone made my deepfake video,” he told the journalists at BJP’s Diwali Milan program in national capital.
PM Modi also called upon the journalists to stay vigilant on issues like artificial intelligence and ‘deepfakes and help make people aware about its consequences’.
“A new crisis is emerging due to deepfakes produced through artificial intelligence. There is a very big section of society which does not have a parallel verification system,” PM told journalists.
PM Modi also said that he has asked the ChatGpt team to flag deepfakes and also put out a warning when such videos make their way to social media.
Notably, the deepfake video of PM Modi which went viral showed a man resembling the Prime Minister dancing and doing garba. An India Today Fact Check reported that the person in video was actually of PM’s lookalike Vikas Mahante.
PM Modi’s remarks come amid anxiety & anger over series of deepfake videos involving leading actresses. In the viral deepfake videos, the torso of some person was fixed with faces of actresses like Rashmika Mandana, Katrina Kaif and Kajol and then circulated on internet.
What govt said on threat posed by deepfakes
The government was prompt enough to take note of the deepfakes creating chaos in the society.
Rajeev Chandrasekhar, Union minister for electronics and technology, said that deepfakes are the latest and a “more dangerous and damaging form of misinformation” that needs to be dealt firmly.
The Centre has also informed that anyone caught over circulation of deepfakes will be charged with strong penalty of Rs 1 lakh penalty & three years in jail.
