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YouTube is working on multiple deepfake-detection tools to help creators find videos where AI-generated versions of their voices or faces are being used without consent, the Google-owned platform announced Thursday.
Two separate tools are expected, but YouTube hasn't shared a release date for either one yet. The first is a singing voice-detection tool that will be added to YouTube's existing Content ID system. Content ID automatically checks for instances of copyright infringement and can take down entire movies or copies of songs that belong to an established musician, for example.
This first AI-detection feature will mainly be for musicians whose voices are spoofed by AI to produce new songs, but it's unclear whether the tool will work effectively for less-famous artists whose voices are not widely recognized. It'll likely help big record labels keep AI impersonators off YouTube, however, and give the likes of Drake, Billie Eilish, or Taylor Swift the ability to find and take down channels posting AI songs that mimic them.
The second detection tool will help public figures like influencers, actors, athletes, or artists track down and flag AI-generated media of their faces on YouTube. But it's unclear whether YouTube will ever proactively deploy the tool at any point to detect AI-generated images impersonating real people who aren't famous or uploading videos.
Reached for comment, a YouTube rep didn't answer this directly but tells PCMag that YouTube's recently updated privacy policy lets anyone request the removal of deepfake or AI-generated impersonation content, so it looks like deepfaked individuals will have to actively hunt down impersonations to get them removed.
YouTube did not respond to whether it would consider using this tool to proactively remove the scourge of AI-generated scam videos, either. These videos impersonate famous figures like Elon Musk and have popped up across YouTube countless times, often on hacked accounts, in the past few years. YouTube's Community Guidelines don't allow spam, scams, or deceptive content, but viewers must manually report the videos to get them taken down.
While Google and virtually every other major tech firm have evangelized AI's potential and tried to find ways to add it to every corner of their businesses, the widespread, cheap, or free access to AI tools also means it's become much easier to make deepfake media of other people. Last year, one study found that the number of deepfake videos online has spiked 550% since 2021. It tracked over 95,000 deepfake videos on the internet, noting that 98% of them were porn and a staggering 99% of the impersonated individuals were women.
The US Department of Homeland Security has also called deepfakes an "increasing threat," flagging misuse of the AI-powered "Wav2Lip" lip-syncing technology as cause for concern. Even just a 15-second Instagram video can be enough material to create deepfake pornography of a person, the DHS notes.
Ultimately, YouTube says it wants AI to "enhance human creativity, not replace it," and is developing these new deepfake-detection tools to help public figures delete impersonations as they spread.