The deputy prime minister has called for international collaboration to prevent AI threats to democracy and the electoral process, including through deepfake disinformation.
Speaking at the Summit for Democracy in Seoul on Tuesday, Deputy Prime Minister Oliver Dowden announced a multi-government compact to counter AI disinformation from bad actors and “malign foreign states”.
The increasingly convincing ability of AI to generate realistic images, audio and video of public figures has prompted disinformation concerns as major states, including the UK and US, approach elections.
“What the UK is leading on is a government-led process, a government-led agreement to tackle the threat from AI from foreign states,” Dowden said.
AI-generated deepfake audio clips have already been used to spread false information about Labour politicians Kier Starmer and Sadiq Khan. Dowden said the compact “is not about the internal politics of each individual nation states, that’s rightly a matter for nation states”.
Dowden did not specify which nations had agreed to be part of the compact, however, he claimed several states had already signed up.
The agreement follows the signing of the Bletchley Declaration at the AI Safety Summit in November. The declaration saw 28 governments jointly agree to collaborate on AI safety.
The compact announcement coincides with the release of the Deepfakes, Elections and National Security report from Scientists for Labour.
Published today, the report recommended a handful of measures to combat deepfake misinformation, including criminalisation of the practice and stricter labelling requirements for AI-generated content.
The proliferation of generative AI has increased pressure on the startups building the software to take steps to prevent misuse.
London-based AI startup Synthesia, which generates video presentations hosted by AI avatars reading user scripts, was controversially misused to make pro-Venezuelan government propaganda last year.
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