Scammers Are Using AI Modi Cheapfakes to Target India's Poor

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Did Bihar’s National Democratic Alliance (NDA) leaders fund Pakistan’s Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI)?

A series of highly realistic videos featuring prominent Indian journalists—Palki Sharma and Shiv Aroor—have gone viral, wherein they’re apparently reporting that four senior leaders from Bihar’s National Democratic Alliance (NDA) are under investigation for allegedly financing Pakistan’s Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI).

One video, purportedly showing journalist Ravish Kumar, even alleges that the funding was channelled through offshore accounts to support a pro-India narrative around “Operation Sindoor.”

Hold on! Is any of this real? 

BOOM found these videos are digitally manipulated and contain AI-generated audio and altered visuals. 

What We Found

Ravish Kumar’s video:

We analysed the video through two deepfake voice detection tools, Hiya Deepfake Voice Detector and DeepFake-O-Meter by the University at Buffalo’s Media Forensics Lab. Hiya Deepfake Voice Detector gave the voice an authenticity score of 1/100, flagging it as highly likely to be a deepfake. 

Next, we checked the original news report uploaded by Ravish Kumar on his official YouTube channel on November 20, and found that he does not mention anything about NDA funding PTI or Operation Sindoor. The original footage has been doctored using an AI voice clone to make the false claim. 

Palki Sharma & Shiv Aroor’s videos:

BOOM ran the clips through the DeepFake-O-Meter tool and a majority of its audio and video detection models flagged both the visuals and the soundtracks as having a high likelihood of being AI-generated.

Also, we consulted with our partners at the Deepfakes Analysis Unit (DAU), who ran the clips through multiple audio and video detection tools. DAU flagged repeated upper-body loops, unnatural blinking, and facial distortion. Furthermore, tools including Hive, Hiya, and Aurigin AI indicated a strong likelihood of synthetic manipulation across both visuals and sound. 

DECODE

Modi Cheapfakes, Election Freebies: Scammers Use AI To Prey On India’s Poor

In the weeks before Bihar's assembly elections, construction worker Akul Sharma saw what he thought was Prime Minister Narendra Modi announcing free motorcycles. 

The video was real. The voice was not. Sharma nearly became one of the many Indians targeted by scammers using AI-generated voice clones of the prime minister to steal money and personal data through fraudulent social media ads. 

Decode’s Shivam Bhardwaj identified multiple Instagram accounts pumping out cheapfakes, manipulated media using rudimentary editing techniques, during the festival period between Diwali and Chhath Puja this year.

LAW, JUSTICE ET AL

CJI Surya Kant's Three-Front Battle: Pendency, Appointments, Trust

Justice Surya Kant was sworn in as the 53rd Chief Justice of India At Rashtrapati Bhavan by President of India Droupadi Murmu. CJI Surya Kant, who succeeded CJI BR Gavai, inherits a backlog of cases across the judiciary, vacancies across constitutional courts and tribunals and has the task of restoring credibility for the institution that has seen much criticism in the past few years. 

Before being sworn in as the top judge, CJI Kant spoke to the media at an informal gathering at his official residence where he outlined his plan to tackle arrears in cases. CJI Kant said he planned to reduce pendency by ensuring “optimal utilisation of judges.” 

CJI Kant said he would take a holistic view about the use of Artificial Intelligence in the judiciary. CJI Kant accepted it is a “grey area”, and that one would need to determine the boundaries of how much AI is required in the judicial process. “After all, when the public comes to court, they want a judge to hear their matters,” CJI Kant said. Ritika Jain reports.

'FAKE NEWS’ YOU ALMOST FELL FOR

🔍  Did General Upendra Dwivedi, Chief of Army Staff (COAS), say Arunachal Pradesh should be given to China to stop Beijing from supporting Pakistan? Find out in 🔗 Anmol Alphonso’s ↗️ fact-check.

🔍  A video circulating on X claimed to show NDTV anchor Abhishek Sengupta citing an internal report stating that the Tejas fighter jet involved in the recent crash had “not been technically cleared to fly.” 🔗 Archis Chowdhury ↗️ tells you the truth.

🔍  A deepfake video of Air Chief Marshal AP Singh where he appears to say that he had warned the Indian government about not inducting the Tejas fighter jet in the Indian Air Force (IAF) was shared as real. Read 🔗 Srijit Das’ ↗️ fact-check.

🅱️ RECOMMENDS

This week's recommendation is: People are poorly equipped to detect AI-powered voice clones

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Verified By Boom is written by Divya Chandra, edited by Adrija Bose and designed by H Shiva Roy Chowdhury.

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