Trump Introduces New Depravity to Elections: Blackfake

Fake images circulating the internet portray Donald Trump surrounded by a group of smiling black voters, this incident highlights the danger that artificial intelligence poses on the 2024 American elections.

Initially, it seemed that the images of President Trump with his Black voters were nothing out of the ordinary, but when looking closer, one could tell that something was not right. Other than the image being too perfect due to Trump being happily surrounded by Black voters, the lighting of the image gave off the hint that the image was generated by AI. Although the images were generated, they haven’t been linked to the Trump campaign or an attempt to win over Black voters whose loyalty goes to President Joe Biden.

In a recent BBC investigation, it highlighted the fact that deepfake images would be an issue as the elections approached in November 2024. Experts in the field of deepfake AI images have mentioned that these images would be a threat to voters who aren’t fully aware of the presence of deepfake images. As well as having the deepfake images target certain groups to cause confusion and mislead them in whom to vote for.

During the week, a report by the nonprofit Center for Countering Digital Hate used several AI programs to show how these deepfakes are generated realistically to manipulate voters. According to Imran Ahmed, CEO, and founder of the center, various social media platforms should implement rules to protect the voters from the harmful effects of deepfakes. He continued to mention that AI companies must also implement rules and regulations. This is a crucial point because AI companies should not be able to generate fake images to manipulate or harm users, but rather the generation of images should be for beneficial use.

“If a picture is worth a thousand words, then these dangerously susceptible image generators, coupled with the dismal content moderation efforts of mainstream social media, represent as powerful a tool for bad actors to mislead voters as we’ve ever seen,” Ahmed stated. “This is a wake-up call for AI companies, social media platforms, and lawmakers – act now or put American democracy at risk.”

The deepfake Trump images were alarming to both ends, which are the Black community and Trump’s campaign. Trump’s supporters have expressed their frustration regarding the circulation of fake images. They believe that the images generated undermine the Republicans as a whole. On the other hand, Diante Johnson, president of the Black Conservative Federation, stated that, “If you see a photo of Trump with Black folks, and you don’t see it posted on an official campaign or surrogate page, it didn’t happen. It’s nonsensical to think that the Trump campaign would have to use AI to show his Black support.”

Generating deepfake content does have a corrosive effect on the voting community as a whole. The only thing that one has to keep in mind is that Trump is the man of social media. He is extremely active on various platforms, and his speeches mostly consist

Several platforms either banned him or restricted his access, such as Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Reddit, Twitch, Shopify, YouTube, and Snapchat. He has been banned everywhere; do you think he will be banned from AI image-generating platforms as well?

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