The Pentagon Wants to Flood Social Media With Fake AI People
"This will only embolden other militaries or adversaries to do the same."
As The Intercept reports, a wishlist put forward by the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) — a furtive counterterrorism group within the US Department of Defense (DoD) — reveals the agency's interest in using generative AI to create fake online internet users.
That's despite the US government's persistent warnings that deepfakes and other AI-generated content will deepen the misinformation crisis and lead to a muddier information ecosystem for everyone.
In the document, JSOC explains that it's seeking "technologies that can generate convincing online personas for use on social media platforms, social networking sites, and other online content" for use by Special Operations Forces. This "solution," JSOC adds, "should include facial and background imagery, facial and background video, and audio layers."
According to the wishlist, JSOC wants SOF agents to "use this capability to gather information from public online forums."
In other words, JSOC wants to provide its special ops teams with the technology to create sophisticated, bespoke AI deepfakes, capable of convincing social media users that they're the real deal for the sake of information-gathering efforts.
Article