Latest news with #deepfakes
The Independent
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- The Independent
‘Le Slap' talks to the dark truth at the core of Brigitte and Emmanuel Macron's marriage
Was it just 'joking around', or, as the official party line claims, a 'moment of closeness' between the French president, Emmanuel Macron, and his wife, Brigitte, that set tongues wagging around the world this week? After a video of Brigitte Macron, 72, appearing to shove her 47-year-old husband in the face went viral on Monday, 'Le Slap' – or ' Slapgate' as it quickly became known – went viral. Probably because it didn't look as though the pair were 'decompressing one last time' before beginning their diplomatic visit to Hanoi, Vietnam, as a source desperately claimed. Initially, conspiracy theorists claimed that the footage of the heated row was part of a plot to discredit the president, and had come straight from the Kremlin. In a world of AI-generated videos, where a pope can be seen wearing a Balenciaga coat and Macron can be spied dancing to 1980s hit song 'Voyage Voyage' by French singer Desireless in a video he once made himself to make a point about deepfakes, it seemed it was something to consider. Certainly, Macron's first reaction was to condemn the videos of him, saying the footage had been manipulated by people he described as 'crackpots'. He referred to other incidents, including the images shot on a train to Kyiv, in which some accounts falsely claimed he could be seen sharing cocaine. For the rest of us, though, this incident looked different, and it felt as though the president was putting on quite the show in an attempt to dismiss the furore. The Macrons put on a united front, yet there was ultimately no avoiding their frustration as media attention grew: by the end of the week, Macron admitted that the video showing the altercation had become what he called 'some kind of planetary catastrophe' (a slight exaggeration). But regardless of how the Macrons tried to frame the incident, it was a sharp-eyed glimpse into the couple's relationship; an indication of underlying tension between them coming to the surface. Perhaps it's just the tip of the iceberg. Because it's no secret – though it is often too easily brushed off, or forgotten – that at the heart of the Macrons' relationship lies an ethical dilemma at best; a gross abuse of power at worst. The couple met when Brigitte Trogneux was 39 and Emmanuel was just 15. Brigitte was already married to banker André Auzière, and a mother of three children – Sebastien, Laurence, and Tiphaine. In fact, one of her daughters, Laurence, was in the same class as the boy her mother would eventually marry, at La Providence High School, a Catholic secondary school in Amiens. Emmanuel was 'intellectually gifted' and 'precocious' as a teenager, and he and his future wife bonded over literature and theatre, Brigitte told Paris Match during an interview in 2017. The two of them wrote a play together; she later recalled, during the time she spent with him, having a 'feeling I was working with Mozart'. 'The writing became an excuse,' she said. 'I felt that we had always known each other.' Despite their 'bond' remaining supposedly platonic, by the following year, Emmanuel's parents were removing him from the school, concerned after finding out about the relationship through a family friend. 'We just couldn't believe it,' his mother, Francoise Nogues-Macron, told Anne Fulda, author of the book Emmanuel Macron: A Perfect Young Man. 'What is clear is that when Emmanuel met Brigitte, we couldn't just say, 'That's great'.' Physically separating the pair didn't work – by the time the French president was 17, he was already declaring that he would marry Brigitte one day. Later, he would write in his 2016 book, Révolution, that he was captivated by her intelligence and charisma. 'I resisted for a long time, but love is stronger than conventions,' he told Elle magazine in 2020. The thing is, it was hardly something as simple as 'conventions' that made their relationship objectionable – the exact year they met, either 1993 or 1994, has reportedly never been confirmed, in what is thought by some to be an effort to obscure legal 'complications' or questions that might be raised, since Emmanuel was just a child. While Brigitte has always insisted that they only fell in love after he was 15 (which is the age of consent in France), she risked serving three years in prison, since the law bans sexual relationships between teachers and pupils under 18. Regardless of the justifications, then, she knew it was wrong. The couple didn't marry until years later, in October 2007, when Emmanuel was 29 and Brigitte was 54, but the foundations of their relationship were set: a narrative of manipulation, societal ostracism, and a profound imbalance of power that has shaped their personal and political lives ever since. Their age gap is more than just a number – it's a gap that would rarely, if ever, go without objection if it were between an older man and a teenage girl. Brigitte was also in a position of power, a teacher – an authority figure who was responsible for a vulnerable and impressionable adolescent. At their wedding, Emmanuel acknowledged the obvious peculiarity, saying, 'We're not a normal couple, but we are a couple.' Initially, they faced a backlash to their unusual relationship. According to Maëlle Brun, who wrote an unauthorised biography of Brigitte Macron, there were repercussions of sorts; they were ostracised, anonymous letters were sent to their families, and there were even instances of spitting on their doorstep. The friends that Brigitte had made through her first marriage disappeared – yet the Macrons' relationship apparently flourished. In the years since, as Emmanuel charted his rise to the top of French politics, Brigitte has been described as a 'shadow power' at his side. She is believed to be an influential figure in his career; there have been reports of her becoming involved in his ministerial duties and presidential campaigns, despite grumbling over the impropriety of this – and perceived conflicts of interest – among the public. For years, despite the doubts that have surrounded their relationship because of how it began, they've been good at keeping up appearances in front of the camera. But this week's footage talks to the tension at the core of their marriage: an imbalance of power that they have seemingly never escaped. Lip-reading experts claimed that, in the moments after the 'slap' – which, really, looked more like a shove in the face – Brigitte muttered, 'Dégage, espèce de loser,' as her husband offered his arm – in English, 'Stay away, you loser.' A funny joke, as Emmanuel claims? It seems unlikely. A clearer angle, perhaps, on the dark heart of a controversial relationship – one that has left an indelible mark on the couple's lives and careers. Though it is often portrayed as a romantic saga, the story of the Macrons is layered with complexities, and begs for scrutiny. In the golden salons of the Élysée, Emmanuel and Brigitte Macron may project the defiant image of a couple who triumphed against the odds and have defied scandal and stigma. But beyond the veneer of fairytale romance lies something that is not just more complex, but far more uncomfortable: a relationship that began in the blurred margins of power and abuse, with this week's events leaving many wondering if it remains there.
The Independent
25-05-2025
- The Independent
Public told to use secret codes to stop AI deepfake scams
Experts have issued advice on how to combat increasingly sophisticated AI impersonation scams. Cybersecurity expert Cody Barrow recommends establishing secret passwords with close contacts. Barrow, chief executive of cybersecurity firm EclecticIQ and a former advisor to the US government, warns that the rise of readily available AI technology has simplified the creation of convincing deepfakes, making it easier for malicious actors to impersonate loved ones. By creating and using shared secret phrases or passwords, individuals can quickly verify the authenticity of the person they are communicating with, adding a vital layer of security against potential fraud. He told the PA news agency that AI was helping to 'lower the barrier to entry' for cybercriminals, and extra precautions beyond basic online security were needed to combat it. 'AI is huge. It's not just hype. It's very easy to dismiss it as such, but it's really not,' Mr Barrow said. 'My wife and I were actually just discussing this – in recent months, we have (created) a secret code that we use that only the real me or the real her would know, so that if one of us ever receives a FaceTime video or WhatsApp video that looks and sounds like us, asking for money, asking for help – something very scary – we can use that code to verify that we're the right person. 'So the fact that I'm doing that indicates what I think of it, right? I think it's very real. 'We will see that it is much easier to generate deepfakes to fool people, to write phishing emails that look real. So I think it does lower the barrier to entry. It may also open the door to non-English speaking threat actors.' Mr Barrow added that such an approach was necessary because the sheer number of data breaches in recent years meant the majority of people online would have had their personal details compromised at some point, so additional security was needed. He said creating secret passwords among friends and family was especially important for older and younger users who may not have the best digital skills. Mr Barrow added: 'It may sound dramatic here in May 2025, but I'm quite confident that within a number of years, if not months, people will look back and say, absolutely yes, I should have done that, and I do think everyone should do it, especially if you have either more elderly family members or younger family members – because we have a lot of younger people who don't actually understand this stuff either. 'Just about every human who's used a computer or the internet has an old email account that's been compromised at some stage when they had a non-secure password, which probably most people still do, and that email was compromised and someone stole their contact list. 'Then from that contact list, it's not hard to generate malicious tooling that can duplicate the likeness of someone on that list and then send you some sort of scam that makes it look like it's actually from that person. 'So I very much think everyone should have a secret password.' Mr Barrow's warning comes in the wake of a string of cyber attacks on UK retailers, including Marks and Spencer and the Co-op. Earlier this week, M&S said its breach had been caused by 'human error' after hackers were able to gain access via a third party, after using social engineering – human error or misjudgment – in order to get into the retailer's systems. Mr Barrow said that the hackers in this attack were likely to have taken advantage of the fact they are reportedly native English speakers to help scam their way into M&S's systems. But he also warned that predictable security set-ups, such as using two-factor authentication, may have also aided the cybercriminals in creating a realistic looking scam. 'The landscape that we're seeing now is that we're seeing a lot of people are really immunised and used to the security procedures they have to follow,' he said. 'They're used to having to enter their phone authenticator code and do all the prompts. And so it was relatively trivial for this threat actor, which speaks native English, to really trick people into going through those motions and abusing multi-factor authentication to get into these outlets.'
TechCrunch
24-05-2025
- Politics
- TechCrunch
Why a new anti-revenge porn law has free speech experts alarmed
Privacy and digital rights advocates are raising alarms over a law that many would expect them to cheer: a federal crackdown on revenge porn and AI-generated deepfakes. The newly signed Take It Down Act makes it illegal to publish nonconsensual explicit images — real or AI-generated — and gives platforms just 48 hours to comply with a victim's takedown request or face liability. While widely praised as a long-overdue win for victims, experts have also warned its vague language, lax standards for verifying claims, and tight compliance window could pave the way for overreach, censorship of legitimate content, and even surveillance. 'Content moderation at scale is widely problematic and always ends up with important and necessary speech being censored,' India McKinney, director of federal affairs at Electronic Frontier Foundation, a digital rights organization, told TechCrunch. Online platforms have one year to establish a process for removing nonconsensual intimate imagery (NCII). While the law requires takedown requests come from victims or their representatives, it only asks for a physical or electronic signature — no photo ID or other form of verification is needed. That likely aims to reduce barriers for victims, but it could create an opportunity for abuse. 'I really want to be wrong about this, but I think there are going to be more requests to take down images depicting queer and trans people in relationships, and even more than that, I think it's gonna be consensual porn,' McKinney said. Senator Marsha Blackburn (R-TN), a co-sponsor of the Take It Down Act, also sponsored the Kids Online Safety Act which puts the onus on platforms to protect children from harmful content online. Blackburn has said she believes content related to transgender people is harmful to kids. Similarly, the Heritage Foundation — the conservative think tank behind Project 2025 — has also said that 'keeping trans content away from children is protecting kids.' Because of the liability that platforms face if they don't take down an image within 48 hours of receiving a request, 'the default is going to be that they just take it down without doing any investigation to see if this actually is NCII or if it's another type of protected speech, or if it's even relevant to the person who's making the request,' said McKinney. Techcrunch event Join us at TechCrunch Sessions: AI Secure your spot for our leading AI industry event with speakers from OpenAI, Anthropic, and Cohere. For a limited time, tickets are just $292 for an entire day of expert talks, workshops, and potent networking. Exhibit at TechCrunch Sessions: AI Secure your spot at TC Sessions: AI and show 1,200+ decision-makers what you've built — without the big spend. Available through May 9 or while tables last. Berkeley, CA | REGISTER NOW Snapchat and Meta have both said they are supportive of the law, but neither responded to TechCrunch's requests for more information about how they'll verify whether the person requesting a takedown is a victim. Mastodon, a decentralized platform that hosts its own flagship server that others can join, told TechCrunch it would lean towards removal if it was too difficult to verify the victim. Mastodon and other decentralized platforms like Bluesky or Pixelfed may be especially vulnerable to the chilling effect of the 48-hour takedown rule. These networks rely on independently operated servers, often run by nonprofits or individuals. Under the law, the FTC can treat any platform that doesn't 'reasonably comply' with takedown demands as committing an 'unfair or deceptive act or practice' – even if the host isn't a commercial entity. 'This is troubling on its face, but it is particularly so at a moment when the chair of the FTC has taken unprecedented steps to politicize the agency and has explicitly promised to use the power of the agency to punish platforms and services on an ideological, as opposed to principled, basis,' the Cyber Civil Rights Initiative, a nonprofit dedicated to ending revenge porn, said in a statement. Proactive monitoring McKinney predicts that platforms will start moderating content before it's disseminated so they have fewer problematic posts to take down in the future. Platforms are already using AI to monitor for harmful content. Kevin Guo, CEO and co-founder of AI-generated content detection startup Hive, said his company works with online platforms to detect deepfakes and child sexual abuse material (CSAM). Some of Hive's customers include Reddit, Giphy, Vevo, Bluesky, and BeReal. 'We were actually one of the tech companies that endorsed that bill,' Guo told TechCrunch. 'It'll help solve some pretty important problems and compel these platforms to adopt solutions more proactively.' Hive's model is a software-as-a-service, so the startup doesn't control how platforms use its product to flag or remove content. But Guo said many clients insert Hive's API at the point of upload to monitor before anything is sent out to the community. A Reddit spokesperson told TechCrunch the platform uses 'sophisticated internal tools, processes, and teams to address and remove' NCII. Reddit also partners with nonprofit SWGfl to deploy its StopNCII tool, which scans live traffic for matches against a database of known NCII and removes accurate matches. The company did not share how it would ensure the person requesting the takedown is the victim. McKinney warns this kind of monitoring could extend into encrypted messages in the future. While the law focuses on public or semi-public dissemination, it also requires platforms to 'remove and make reasonable efforts to prevent the reupload' of nonconsensual intimate images. She argues this could incentivize proactive scanning of all content, even in encrypted spaces. The law doesn't include any carve outs for end-to-end encrypted messaging services like WhatsApp, Signal, or iMessage. Meta, Signal, and Apple have not responded to TechCrunch's request for more information on their plans for encrypted messaging. Broader free speech implications On March 4, Trump delivered a joint address to Congress in which he praised the Take It Down Act and said he looked forward to signing it into law. 'And I'm going to use that bill for myself, too, if you don't mind,' he added. 'There's nobody who gets treated worse than I do online.' While the audience laughed at the comment, not everyone took it as a joke. Trump hasn't been shy about suppressing or retaliating against unfavorable speech, whether that's labeling mainstream media outlets 'enemies of the people,' barring The Associated Press from the Oval Office despite a court order, or pulling funding from NPR and PBS. On Thursday, the Trump administration barred Harvard University from accepting foreign student admissions, escalating a conflict that began after Harvard refused to adhere to Trump's demands that it make changes to its curriculum and eliminate DEI-related content, among other things. In retaliation, Trump has frozen federal funding to Harvard and threatened to revoke the university's tax-exempt status. 'At a time when we're already seeing school boards try to ban books and we're seeing certain politicians be very explicitly about the types of content they don't want people to ever see, whether it's critical race theory or abortion information or information about climate change…it is deeply uncomfortable for us with our past work on content moderation to see members of both parties openly advocating for content moderation at this scale,' McKinney said.
Fox News
23-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Fox News
'Frasier' star Kelsey Grammer voices growing alarm over AI manipulation
While artificial intelligence (AI) is playing a bigger role than ever in Hollywood, award-winning actor Kelsey Grammer is warning it may be "dangerous." The "Karen: A Brother Remembers" author opened up about his growing concern over AI deepfakes and the potential blurred lines between reality and manipulation. "What I'm a little sad about is our prevalence these days to come up with so many, as they try to say deepfakes," he told Fox News Digital. "You know, the ones who say it usually are the ones who are actually doing it. It's a very, very strange game out there." AI-generated images, known as "deepfakes," often involve editing videos or photos of people to make them look like someone else by using artificial intelligence. While the "Frasier" star has acknowledged AI to be beneficial in some capacity, including in the medical field, Grammer shared his reservations about how the system can potentially fabricate someone's identity in seconds. WATCH: KELSEY GRAMMER WARNS AI WILL 'NEVER REFLECT THE SAME SPONTANEITY' AS HUMANS "I recognize the validity and the potential in AI," Grammer said. "Especially in medicine and a number of other things." "I recognize the validity and the potential in AI, especially in medicine and a number of other things." Grammer warned, "But AI still is... I mean, I know they're working on AGI now, which is probably a different animal, the one that maybe we should be more alarmed about." AGI stands for artificial general intelligence - a hypothetical stage in the development of machine learning in which an AI system can match or exceed the cognitive abilities of human beings across any task, according to IBM. WATCH: KELSEY GRAMMER 'CURSED GOD' AFTER SISTER KAREN'S MURDER Meanwhile, the "Cheers" star continued to voice his concern about AI and the integrity behind it. "AI is never any better than the people who programmed it," he added. "But of course, now, it's self-teaching, and maybe it will actually find a way to enhance its abilities beyond what the human input's been." As the Hollywood actor has spent most of his illustrious career delivering scripted lines with human depth, Grammer told Fox News Digital he does not believe AI can replicate that genuineness. "I'm still fairly confident that it will never reflect the same spontaneity that is the human being. And so watching a human being — the real human being — will always be more interesting," Grammer said. "We have to return to a sense of integrity and basically good manners." Grammer recently released the memoir, "Karen: A Brother Remembers." The book is available everywhere books are sold.
Malay Mail
23-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Malay Mail
Melania Trump warns of deepfakes — then releases AI audiobook using a digital clone of her voice
WASHINGTON, May 23 — US First Lady Melania Trump warned recently of the danger of AI deepfakes. Now she is releasing an audiobook narrated by an artificial intelligence-generated version of her own voice. The 55-year-old wife of President Donald Trump announced the release of the seven-hour recording — which retails for US$25 (RM106) — in a social media post on Thursday. 'My story, my perspective, the truth,' narrates a voice in the Slovenian-born former model's distinctive accent, over a short black and white video featuring computer-generated graphics of her face. Whether it's Melania herself who is speaking in the video, or her AI doppelganger, is not made clear. She then writes in the same post: 'I am honoured to bring you Melania — The AI Audiobook — narrated entirely using artificial intelligence in my own voice. 'Let the future of publishing begin.' The website for the audiobook says the 'AI-generated replica' of Melania Trump's voice was 'created under Mrs. Trump's direction and supervision'. 'Multiple' foreign language versions would be available later this year, it added. Melania Trump released the physical edition of her memoir to great fanfare in October — with a signed collector's edition printed on 'premium art paper' priced at US$150. The release of the AI-narrated audiobook comes just days after she joined President Trump to sign a bill making it a federal crime to post 'revenge porn' — whether real or generated using AI. Melania Trump had campaigned for the 'Take It Down Act' in March in her first solo event since her husband returned to power, speaking out against 'malicious online content, like deepfakes'. The First Lady has largely been an elusive figure at the White House since her husband took the oath of office on January 20, spending only limited time in Washington alongside her billionaire husband. But it has not stopped her from taking on a handful of projects that carefully control her image — and make money too. As well as the AI audiobook, Melania is filming a documentary series with Amazon, under a contract reportedly worth tens of millions of dollars. — AFP
