House Intel to hold hearing on deepfakes

The House Intelligence Committee is planning to hold a hearing in the coming months that will examine a series of national security matters, including the threat of videos manipulated by artificial intelligence that look strikingly real, according to a committee aide.

Warnings about the disinformation threat of these so-called deepfakes are growing louder ahead of the 2020 election, but Congress remains in the early stages of pressing the intelligence community to examine the threat.

House Intelligence Chairman Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) warned that foreign and domestic actors could “wreak havoc” with the technology during elections.

“Now with deepfake technology, the Russians can push out fake audio or fake video that is indistinguishable from being real. They can make candidates for office say things they’ve never said,” Schiff said.

Schiff said one of his chief concerns in 2016 was whether WikiLeaks added forged documents to the authentic ones it published after emails were stolen from the Democratic National Committee.

He said faked videos could be “far more debilitating,” and even have “an election-altering impact.”