"A challenge that European democracies are totally unprepared for." That was the reaction of one MEP to images that recently went viral on social media. The pictures, generated by artificial intelligence, purported to show French President Emmanuel Macron collecting rubbish, and former US president Donald Trump being arrested. In both cases the context was real – a rubbish collectors strike in France; the indictment of Donald Trump – but the images were not.
Such fakes are now relatively simple for artificial intelligence programmes to produce. But the more advanced innovations have prompted 1,000 entrepreneurs in America to sign an open letter urging an end to giant AI experiments. If this doesn't happen, they say, the dangers are way past human imagination.
