As generation models continue to improve we could end up in a world where it’s impossible to trust what we can see and hear in recorded media. Considering how central the media is to modern society in general, let alone politics, that’s going to have grave consequences.

There’s no obvious way to combat the deepfake threat either. The output of these generative models become harder to detect as generated by design. As hardware and software improves, it will also become easier and easier for people to run these models. There are already many image models that can already be easily run on a typical gaming computer. With how widespread it could become there is little chance of “banning” them.

I think one approach could be to instead focus on ways to verify genuine media rather than trying to detect or control the fakes. But with how readily some people will already trust obviously dubious sources of media, even that might not be enough.