Facebook bans deepfake videos

MANILA, Philippines — Misleading “deepfakes,” or manipulated videos that use artificial intelligence (AI) to show people saying or doing things they never did, will no longer be allowed on social media platform Facebook.

Monika Bickert, Facebook’s vice president for global policy management, announced yesterday the policy changes that will remove misleading manipulated videos identified as deepfakes in the social media platform.

The ban covers manipulated videos that have “been edited or synthesized – beyond adjustments for clarity or quality – in ways that aren’t apparent to an average person and would likely mislead someone into thinking that a subject of the video said words that they did not actually say.”

Also banned are media that are products of artificial intelligence or machine learning that merge, replace or superimpose content onto a video, making it appear to be authentic.

Bickert said the new policy is a result of collaboration among various efforts to improve the science of detecting manipulated media.

“Our approach has several components, from investigating AI-generated content and deceptive behaviors like fake accounts, to partnering with academia, government and industry to exposing people behind these efforts,” she said.

She said the new policy does not extend to content that is parody or satire, or video that has been edited solely to omit or change the order of words. 

“Consistent with our existing policies, audio, photos or videos, whether a deepfake or not, will be removed from Facebook if they violate any of our other community standards, including those governing nudity, graphic violence, voter suppression and hate speech,” said the Facebook official.

“Videos that don’t meet these standards for removal are still eligible for review by one of our independent third-party fact-checkers, which include over 50 partners worldwide fact-checking in over 40 languages,” she added.

The Facebook official said that photos or videos rated false or partly false by a fact-checker will have their distribution in the news feed significantly reduced.

Those who would share it will also see warnings alerting them that the content is false.

“This approach is critical to our strategy and one we heard specifically from our conversations with experts,” Bickert said of the policy against removing false content on the social media platform.

“If we simply removed all manipulated videos flagged by fact-checkers as false, the videos would still be available elsewhere on the internet or social media ecosystem. By leaving them up and labelling them as false, we’re providing people with important information and context,” she added.