In this post, I will show you hacks that can help outsmart deepfake videos.
The technology of deepfake is slowly becoming mainstream and threatens the cybersecurity landscape. Gone are the days when it is only just a game for techy savvy people. These days, it is circulating in various channels and easy tricks people. This technology is now widely accessible, automated, and quickly generated where algorithms do the trick for you.
You might have caught of video of the US ex-president Barrack Obama giving his speech warning everyone about fake videos to learn that the video is indeed fake. It is compelling and alarming at the same time that a fake video can come out like a real one. That is an example of how deepfakes can easily sway people to believe that these videos are the real deal.
What Is A Deep Fake?
The term ‘deep fake’ are conjoined terms from deep, which insinuates from ‘deep learning’ and ‘fake’ from the root word itself. Merriam Webster Dictionary defines it as an edited video that uses an algorithm to replace the video’s original character with another person.
It is defined as a video that utilizes AI technology to paste a well-known personality or even an average person to another body. Deepfake is now a widely used term that refers to any video or presentation that has undergone enhancement by modern technology like Artificial Intelligence to falsify results.
As more fake videos continue to emerge these days, it heightened the concern of many cybersecurity experts. People now rely heavily on technology, and these manipulated videos can quickly come across anyone who has access to the internet.
To ensure that you will not fall victim to these kinds of a video circulating online, you need to learn how to spot a deepfake video. Though it is not that easy and needs scrutinizing eyes, it will help you identify one.
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How To Spot A Deepfake Video
Knowing whether a video is real or not is not an easy task. Here are some hacks you can try to help you determine the fundamental nature of a video you might encounter online.
Look For A Normal Gaze
A typical person blinks 15-20 times per minute. It is also a facial movement that an average person does either off or on cam. With deepfake, it is hard to come up with realistic eyes making it one of the greatest struggles for deepfake creators.
Most deepfake videos have lazy eyes or an odd gaze, which is very unnatural. When a certain does not blink or lack blinking within an expected timeframe, it could be an excellent sign to tell that video is fake.
Some creators have already evolved these days and have since adapted from the gaze that appears creepy and steady. However, leaning on this method can still be an excellent way to determine a deepfake video.
Watch Out For Hair Frizz and Flyaways
Another one of the biggest struggles for deepfake creators is the unmanaged hair. In a typical video, when a person is being interviewed, giving a speech, or just filming himself, an individual hair may come astray. That is because of the minute details an average person does that make an individual hair fall to the face or stick out.
In a deepfake video, you cannot find any frizz or flyaway because there is no real person within the video clip. Hairs are usually not visible in deepfake videos, making it a takeaway should you want to determine whether a particular video is edited or not.
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Play The Video On A Big Screen
When played on a small screen like your smartphone or other mobile devices, fabricated videos are not easily visible. However, when a video is played on full-screen on your laptop or a TV, it will be easier to spot all the editing done on the deepfake video. It will allow you to trace the artifacts done to make it like a legit video.
It can even reveal you other inconsistent details showing on the screen. To further investigate, you can use video editing tools to examine faces by slowing down the playback rate.
Look Out For The Teeth
The dental issue is another struggle for creators of deepfake. Teeth are often misshapen and have an excess in number in these fake videos. It may also appear that some teeth have a blurry touch, and some seem to be merging weirdly. The absence of the outline for individual teeth may be your best clue.
Inconsistent Audio
Many deepfake video creators focus on how they will form the video, losing sight of how the audio is coming up. When this happens, the result usually gives way to quickly identify if the video is a deep fake or not. There can be a low quality lip-synching and robotic-sounding voices included in the video clip. You can also hear strange word pronunciation that is not syncing with how the characters open their mouths.
Awkward Body Posture
You can easily spot deepfake videos by how awkward the body posture is of the person included in the clip. While an average person tends to create movement in videos, a deepfake video will reveal a stance inconsistent with the positioning of the head and the body.
Since most deepfake videos focus on facial features, looking for awkward body posture can become the easiest way to tell if the video. Most creators do not spend time synchronizing the head’s movement and the body, usually giving them out.
Lack Of Emotion
Easily spot a fake video by scrutinizing the emotions exhibit by the character in the clip. If someone is not displaying or exhibiting the emotions needed on the video’s mood, check if the video has been manipulated or image stitches can be found.
Unnatural Images When Slowed Down
Aside from playing it on the big screen, you can slow down the video. While playing on a slowdown rate, you can zoom in and check on the images more closely. You can check the teeth and look for misalignment. Focus also on the lips to see if the person is really talking or only lip-syncing.
Use Deepfake Detection Tools
You can opt to use deepfake detection tools if you are not yet convinced of any video’s true nature after doing all of these possible hacks. Deepfake videos are now becoming so real that people now have a more challenging time to spot any irregularities.
These days, companies like Sensity (formerly Deeptrace) have developed a tool to detect a deepfake video easily. It is an automated detection tool that performs background scans on any media to check if it has tampered or not.
Other institutions like the Reality Defender 2020 from AI foundation can scan and verify videos where it is fake, manipulated, or original. However, it is only an invite-only submission page that is not available to the general public.
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Final Thoughts
The battle to detect deepfake videos is now growing. It has become a more challenging feat as creators of these videos are getting better and easily overruns any deepfake detecting tools.
To ensure that you get not caught of any deepfake fiasco, try to do all of these hacks on any malicious video you might encounter. If it does not work out and you are still skeptical about a particular video you have seen on the internet or received online, make a call or do a video to the other person to know if it a real deal.
Note: This is a guest post by Maricar Morga
Author Bio: Maricar Morga worked as a marketing professional for almost a decade and handled concerts, events and community service-related activities. Leaving her corporate job for good to pursue her dreams, she has now ventured in the path of content writing and currently writes for Softvire Australia – the leading software e-Commerce company in Australia and Softvire New Zealand. A Harry Potter fan, she loves to watch animated series and movies during her spare time.
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