HTX has developed AlchemiX, an innovative tool to identify whether audio or video recordings are genuine or a deepfake.
AlchemiX identifies a deepfake! (Photo: HTX)
While fake videos and sound recordings are not new, the recent arrival of powerful generative artificial intelligence (AI) tools have allowed criminals to rapidly create high quality fakes at minimal cost with minimal effort.
Over the last several months, along with the progressive release of increasingly powerful generative AI tools, the world has seen the release of deepfakes of pop stars, celebrities, and politicians for crimes such as scams and pornography, as well as dangerous attempts to sow social unrest or even to influence elections.
Even more insidiously, the ease of access to generative AI tools allows anyone to create deepfakes. The result has been the disturbing rise in the number of ordinary people finding themselves victimised by crimes such as scams or blackmail involving deepfake audio or video recordings of themselves or their loved ones.
To help authorities fight the scourge of deepfakes, HTX’s Sense-making and Surveillance Centre of Expertise (CoE) has developed AlchemiX, an innovative tool to identify whether audio or video recordings are genuine or a deepfake. (Image deepfake detection is planned for a future release.)
To detect audio and video deepfakes, the media file to be tested is uploaded into AlchemiX, and its algorithm will assess whether the media file has evidence of deepfake. For audio recordings, the user also has the option of uploading a reference file containing an authentic recording of the speaker’s voice into AlchemiX, and the algorithm can compare the test recording with the reference recording to determine how similar the test recording is with the speaker’s actual voice.
AlchemiX is not the first tool of its kind. Early attempts to identify deepfakes looked for telltale indicators such as the absence of blinks. However, subsequent versions of generative AI tools were more sophisticated and could create realistic deepfakes which overcame the earlier limitations. In practical terms, this means deepfake detectors are in a nonstop arms race with deepfake generators!
AlchemiX has been launched and is currently in use. It was showcased at the Milipol Asia-Pacific – TechX Summit exhibition at the Marina Bay Sands convention centre from 3-5 April 2024.