GRAND RAPIDS, Mich — New technologies are bringing new possibilities to modern America. But as artificial intelligence (AI) becomes more advanced and more common, experts are warning of a growing threat ahead of the highly-contested 2024 elections.
"We have made some pretty big advancements in AI technologies, basically deep learning," said Subodha Kumar, teaching as the Paul R. Anderson Distinguished Chair Professor of Statistics, Operations and Data Science at Temple University. "And they're able to now create images and videos and audios, which are much higher quality than what we had earlier."
AI users can now more easily than ever manipulate images to make it appear like someone is saying something that, in fact, they never did.
Such technologies like deepfakes, designed to put out false video with false audio of candidates and others, are sparking concerns over these kinds of technologies from those in charge of elections.
"This has been talked about in the clerk world of what the benefits and the harms of AI could be," Grand Rapids City Clerk Joel Hondorp said.
Overseeing voting for one of the largest cities in the state, Hondorp said, while AI can benefit the swift dissemination of important messages, officials and their partners must work harder than ever before to meet the challenges and get out the facts about the voting process.
"Information coming out from cities, counties, the state on correct information about elections - I think we're gonna just have to up our game as far as social media messaging and also working with the media to get out that information."
Kumar says some of the responsibility also falls to to media companies.
"Google has announced that across all their platforms, including YouTube, if you have a [political] deepfake video, you have to be very, very clear - and not just put a fine print at the bottom - and say that it is a deepfake," Kumar said. "You have to be obvious that it is the fake, right? So, having those kinds of things will not only help users; it will also impact other platforms in doing that."
The average voter, Kumar said, can also work to tackle challenges that AI could pose to what could be a critical election for the nation.
"Users need to be lot more watchful than they have been any other elections," Kumar said.
"Do not trust anything you see on this social media," Kumar said. "Go to the news source and rely on that. That's the first thing users need to do."
In order to do that, officials like Hondorp are urging people to go directly to the source of information, including verified websites for candidates and local municipalities.
"We need to make sure that as clerks, that our websites are up to date, they have the correct information," Hondorp said. "And I think there's going to be a lot of us that are going to be really reviewing our websites as well because people are going to be looking for correct information."
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