- Biden’s AI adviser Ben Buchanan said a way to verify White House posts was “in the works.”
- This year, Biden was the victim of deepfake AI used to misinform voters.
- “We recognize the potential for harm,” Buchanan told BI.
The White House is increasingly aware that the American public needs a way to know that President Joe Biden’s statements and related information are real in the new era of easy-to-use generative AI.
People at the White House have been interested in AI and generative AI since Biden became president in 2020, but last year the use of generative AI exploded with the release of ChatGPT d ‘OpenAI. Big tech players like Meta, Google, Microsoft, and a whole host of startups have been rushing to deliver user-friendly AI tools, leading to a new wave of deepfakes — last month, an AI-generated robocall attempted to undermine voting efforts related to the 2024 presidential election use Biden’s voice.
On Thursday, the Federal Communications Commission said such calls are illegal. Yet there is no end in sight for more sophisticated technologies. new generative AI tools it makes It’s easy for people with little or no technical knowledge to create fake images, videos, and calls that appear authentic.
This is a problem for any government seeking to be a reliable source of information. Ben Buchanan, Biden’s special adviser on artificial intelligence, told Business Insider that the White House is working on a way to verify all of its official communications due to the increase in fake generative AI content.
Buchanan said the goal was to “basically cryptographically verify” anything that came from the White House, whether it was a statement or a video.
While last year’s executive order on AI created an AI Security Institute within the Commerce Department, tasked with creating standards for watermarking content to show provenance, the effort to checking White House communications is separate. And Buchanan said it was “a longer process,” although it was “in the works.”
Ultimately, the goal is to ensure that anyone who sees a video of Biden released by the White House can immediately tell that it is authentic and not altered by a third party.
“This is a case where we recognize the potential for harm,” Buchanan said. “We’re trying to move forward.”
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