関連インシデント
A clip that seemingly shows U.S. President Joe Biden making transphobic remarks has been shared on social media as if authentic. There is no evidence he made such statements, however, and experts told Reuters the video appears to be a deepfake.
Biden can purportedly be heard saying phrases such as: "You will never be a real woman.” He also appears to make references to suicide in the clip, which has been shared on Facebook (here) and Instagram (here).
There is no evidence that Biden ever made these remarks. A search through Google (bit.ly/3HLrfcJ) and the White House transcripts (here) provided no results.
A TinEye search of one of the frames leads to Biden’s announcement on Jan. 25, 2023 that the U.S. would be sending 31 Abrams tanks to Ukraine (here). Footage of this speech (bit.ly/3XbOjH5) shows Biden wearing similar clothes and the same flags behind him as in the manipulated video. Neither this clip nor the official transcript of this speech (here) include any of the remarks made in the video being shared online.
An article by a conservative website (bit.ly/3HGqRvS) identifies the video as a deepfake and Twitter user @MachiavelliMemz as the source (the account has since been suspended) (twitter.com/MachiavelliMemz) (bit.ly/3jIT4u3).
Reuters has previously explained (here) (here) (here) that deepfakes are created by taking source video, identifying motion patterns within an individual’s face, and using artificial intelligence to recreate those movements. They have triggered alarm because a video can now effectively be created of any person saying anything.
Dr. Dominic Lees, Associate Professor of Filmmaking at the University of Reading (here), has conducted research into deepfakes. After looking at the video circulating on social media, he told Reuters via email he believed it had been manipulated by using two open source deepfake algorithms.
“The first is a voice-cloning process, which takes a sample of Joe Biden’s voice as a training sample. The trained algorithm is then able to translate text to speech - here, the false transphobic text,” he said. The second process would be a program “to alter the mouth movements of Biden from the source video to the point where a match is created with the deepfake audio.”
Dr. Siwei Lyu, SUNY Empire Innovation Professor in the Department of Computer Science and Engineering at the State University of New York at Buffalo (here), tested the video circulating online with several deepfake detection algorithms developed under the support of the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency’s (DARPA) Semantic Forensics Program. He concluded it was likely manipulated by using automatic lip-synching algorithms.
“Visually inspecting the video, one sign of manipulation is that when the mouth is fully open, no teeth or tongue is visible and the open space is filled with a dark color,” he said via email, adding that this was an effect of the algorithms in question.
According to Lyu, footage from Biden’s Jan. 25 speech was used to create the deepfake. “The hand gestures used by Biden in both videos are similar, something that cannot be realistically reproduced with current deep fake algorithms yet.”
Biden’s remarks in the manipulated clip contradict his administration’s support for the LGBTQ community. One of his first moves as president was to sign an executive order that overturned a policy banning transgender people from serving in the military (here). He also made statements on the Transgender Day of Remembrance in 2021 and 2022 (here) (here).
The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Verdict
No evidence. There is no evidence that U.S. President Joe Biden made a series of transphobic remarks. Experts told Reuters that a video circulating on social media has been manipulated.