Category Archives: Ai
AI deepfakes are already hitting elections. We have little protection. – The Washington Post
Divyendra Singh Jadouns phone is ringing off the hook. Known as the Indian Deepfaker, Jadoun is famous for using artificial intelligence to create Bollywood sequences and TV commercials.
But as staggered voting in Indias election begins, Jadoun says hundreds of politicians have been clamoring for his services, with more than half asking for unethical things. Candidates asked him to fake audio of competitors making gaffes on the campaign trail or to superimpose challengers faces onto pornographic images. Some campaigns have requested low-quality fake videos of their own candidate, which could be released to cast doubt on any damning real videos that emerge during the election.
Jadoun, 31, says he declines jobs meant to defame or deceive. But he expects plenty of consultants will oblige, bending reality in the worlds largest election, as more than half a billion Indian voters head to the polls.
The only thing stopping us from creating unethical deepfakes is our ethics, Jadoun told The Washington Post. But its very difficult to stop this.
Indias elections, which began last week and run until early June, offer a preview of how an explosion of AI tools is transforming the democratic process, making it easy to develop seamless fake media around campaigns. More than half the worlds population lives in the more than 50 countries hosting elections in 2024, marking a pivotal year for global democracies.
While its unknown how many AI fakes have been made of politicians, experts say they are observing a global uptick of electoral deepfakes.
I am seeing more [political deepfakes] this year than last year and the ones I am seeing are more sophisticated and compelling, said Hany Farid, a computer science professor at the University of California at Berkeley.
While policymakers and regulators from Brussels to Washington are racing to craft legislation restricting the use of AI-powered audio, images and videos on the campaign trail, a regulatory vacuum is emerging. The European Unions landmark AI Act doesnt take effect until after June parliamentary elections. In the U.S. Congress, bipartisan legislation that would ban falsely depicting federal candidates using AI is unlikely to become law before the November elections. A handful of U.S. states have enacted laws penalizing people who make deceptive videos about politicians, creating a patchwork of policy across the country.
In the meantime, there are limited guardrails to deter politicians and their allies from using AI to dupe voters, and enforcers are rarely a match for fakes that can spread quickly across social media or in group chats. The democratization of AI means its up to individuals like Jadoun not regulators to make ethical choices to stave off AI-induced election chaos.
Lets not stand on the sidelines while our elections get screwed up, Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), who chairs the Senate Rules Committee, said in a speech last month at the Atlantic Council. This is like a hair on fire moment. This is not a lets wait three years and see how it goes moment.
For years, nation-state groups flooded Facebook, Twitter (now X) and other social media with misinformation, emulating the playbook Russia famously used in 2016 to stoke discord in U.S. elections. But AI allows smaller actors to partake, making combating falsehoods a fractured and difficult undertaking.
The Department of Homeland Security warned election officials in a memo that generative AI could be used to enhance foreign-influence campaigns targeting elections. AI tools could allow bad actors to impersonate election officials, DHS said in the memo, spreading incorrect information about how to vote or the integrity of the election process.
These warnings are becoming a reality across the world. State-backed actors used generative AI to meddle in Taiwans elections earlier this year. On election day, a Chinese Communist Party-affiliated group posted AI-generated audio of a prominent politician who dropped out of the Taiwanese election throwing his support behind another candidate, according to a Microsoft report. But the politician, Foxconn owner Terry Gou, had never made such an endorsement, and YouTube pulled down the audio.
Divyendra Singh Jadoun used AI to morph Indian Prime Minister Modis voice into making personalized greetings for the Hindu holiday of Diwali. (Video: Divyendra Singh Jadoun)
Taiwan ultimately elected Lai Ching-te, a candidate whom Chinese Communist Party leadership opposed signaling the limits of the campaign to affect the results of the election.
Microsoft expects China to use a similar playbook in India, South Korea and the United States this year. Chinas increasing experimentation in augmenting memes, videos, and audio will likely continue and may prove more effective down the line, the Microsoft report said.
But the low cost and broad availability of generative AI tools have made it possible for people without state backing to engage in trickery that rivals nation-state campaigns.
In Moldova, AI deepfake videos have depicted the countrys pro-Western president, Maia Sandu, resigning and urging people to support a pro-Putin party during local elections. In South Africa, a digitally altered version of the rapper Eminem endorsed a South African opposition party ahead of the countrys election in May.
In January, a Democratic political operative faked President Bidens voice to urge New Hampshire primary voters to not go to the polls a stunt intended to draw awareness to the problems with the medium.
The rise of AI deepfakes could shift the demographics of who runs for office, because bad actors disproportionately use synthetic content to target women.
For years, Rumeen Farhana, an opposition-party politician in Bangladesh, has faced sexual harassment on the internet. But last year, an AI deepfake photo of her in a bikini emerged on social media.
Farhana said it is unclear who made the image. But in Bangladesh, a conservative majority-Muslim country, the photo drew harassing comments from ordinary citizens on social media, with many voters assuming the photo was real.
Such character assassinations might prevent female candidates from subjecting themselves to political life, Farhana said.
Whatever new things come up, its always used against the women first. They are the victim in every case, Farhana said. AI is not an exception in any way.
In the absence of activity from Congress, states are taking action while international regulators are inking voluntary commitments from companies.
About 10 states have adopted laws that would penalize those who use AI to dupe voters. Last month, Wisconsins governor signed a bipartisan bill into law that would fine people who fail to disclose AI in political ads. And a Michigan law punishes anyone who knowingly circulates an AI-generated deepfake within 90 days of an election.
Yet its unclear if the penalties which include fines of up to $1,000 and up to 90 days of jail time, depending on the municipality are steep enough to deter potential offenders.
With limited detection technology and few designated personnel, enforcers may find it difficult to quickly confirm if a video or image is actually AI-generated.
In the absence of regulations, government officials are seeking voluntary agreements from politicians and tech companies alike to control the proliferation of AI-generated election content. European Commission Vice President Vera Jourova said she has sent letters to key political parties in European member states with a plea to resist using manipulative techniques. However, she said, politicians and political parties will face no consequences if they do not heed her request.
I cannot say whether they will follow our advice or not, she said in an interview. I will be very sad if not because if we have the ambition to govern in our member states, then we should also show we can win elections without dirty methods.
Jourova said that in July 2023 she asked large social media platforms to label AI-generated productions ahead of the elections. The request received a mixed response in Silicon Valley, where some platforms told her it would be impossible to develop technology to detect AI.
OpenAI, which makes the chatbot ChatGPT and image generator DALL-E, has also sought to form relationships with the social media companies to address the distribution of AI-generated political materials. At the Munich Security Conference in February, 20 leading technology companies pledged to team up to detect and remove harmful AI content during the 2024 elections.
This is a whole-of-society issue, Anna Makanju, OpenAI vice president of global affairs, said during a Post Live interview. It is not in any of our interests for this technology to be leveraged in this way, and everyone is quite motivated, particularly because we now have lessons from prior elections and from prior years.
Yet companies will not face any penalties if they fail to live up to their pledge. Already, there have been gaps between OpenAIs stated policies and its enforcement. A super PAC backed by Silicon Valley insiders launched an AI chatbot of long-shot presidential candidate Dean Phillips powered by the companys ChatGPT software, in violation of OpenAIs prohibition political campaigns use of its technology. The company did not ban the bot until The Post reported on it.
Jadoun, who does AI political work for Indias major electoral parties, said the spread of deepfakes cant be solved by government alone citizens must be more educated.
Any content that is making your emotions rise to a next level, he said, just stop and wait before sharing it.
Excerpt from:
AI deepfakes are already hitting elections. We have little protection. - The Washington Post
The Week’s 10 Biggest Funding Rounds: Xaira And Other AI Startups Have Huge Week – Crunchbase News
Want to keep track of the largest startup funding deals in 2024 with our curated list of $100 million-plus venture deals to U.S.-based companies? Check out The Crunchbase Megadeals Board.
This is a weekly feature that runs down the weeks top 10 announced funding rounds in the U.S. Check out last weeks biggest funding rounds here.
After a slowdown in big rounds last week, investors were back at it again dishing out nine-figure rounds. This weeks theme was definitely AI, as many of the largest rounds went to startups using AI in coding or biotech.
1. Xaira Therapeutics, $1B, biotech: The biggest round this week was really big. Xaira Therapeutics came out of stealth and announced it had secured more than $1 billion of committed capital from lead investors Arch Venture Partners and Foresite Capital both of which jointly incubated the company as well as several other big-name investors including Sequoia Capital and Lightspeed Venture Partners. The San Francisco-based biotech firm is led by founding CEO Marc Tessier-Lavigne, who previously served as president of Stanford University but resigned last year after questions arose concerning his scientific research. Xaira is the latest although likely best-funded startup to try to use AI models to find new drugs.
2. Augment, $227M, artificial intelligence: AI coding startups made a big splash this week. The biggest round went to another startup emerging from stealth AI coding assistance startup Augment. The Palo Alto, California-based company locked up a $227 million Series B round at a $977 million post-money valuation. The round included cash from the likes of Sutter Hill Ventures, Index Ventures and Lightspeed Venture Partners. Augment helps developers and software teams by giving them AI coding assistance. Founded in 2022, Augments total funding now stands at $252 million, per the company, following its $25 million Series A led by Sutter Hill Ventures in January.
3. Rippling, $200M, human resources: HR startup Rippling wrapped up a huge $200 million round that valued the San Francisco-based startup at $13.5 billion. The deal also included a $590 million secondary offering for employees to sell their private shares to investors. The new equity round was led by Coatue. The company offers a workforce management platform that combines HR, information technology and finance to help customers streamline operations. The new round represents about a 20% uptick in valuation for Rippling, which was last valued at $11.3 billion in March 2023.
4. Cognition, $175M, artificial intelligence: Another nine-figure round for an AI coding startup. This one went to San Francisco-based Cognition, which reportedly locked up a $175 million investment led by Founders Fund at a $2 billion valuation. The six-month-old startup has developed an artificial intelligencepowered coding assistant called Devin. Just last month the startup raised a $21 million Series A at a $350 million valuation.
5. Endeavor BioMedicines, $133M, biotech: Yet another big biotech raise this week. San Diego-based Endeavor BioMedicines locked up a $132.5 million Series C led by AyurMaya. The company, which focuses on medicines for idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, last raised more than two years ago a $101 million Series B co-led by Ally Bridge Group and Avidity Partners. Founded in 2018, the company has raised nearly $296 million, per Crunchbase.
6. ThreatLocker, $115M, cybersecurity: Cyber funding has shown some signs of life recently, and this week we have another example. ThreatLocker, a cybersecurity startup offering zero trust endpoint security solutions, raised a $115 million Series D led by existing investor General Atlantic. In the past year, ThreatLocker has doubled its revenue and added 50% to its workforce. Founded in 2017, the company has raised nearly $240 million, per Crunchbase.
7. Lumeris, $100M, healthcare: St. Louis-based Lumeris, a developer of a healthcare spending platform, raised a $100 million investment led by Deerfield Management and Endeavor Health. Founded in 2000, the company has raised $325 million, per Crunchbase.
8. Perplexity AI, $63M, artificial intelligence: It was a busy week for Perplexity AI. The company announced a $62.7 million round on the same day it was reported the AI startup was looking to raise another $250 million-plus at a valuation between $2.5 billion and $3 billion. The newly announced round was first reported last month and was led by Daniel Gross. It also included investors such as Nvidia, IVP, NEA, Jeff Bezos and Garry Tan among others. The new round reportedly values the company at more than $1 billion. However, per the report in TechCrunch, the AI search engine startup is far from done, engaging investors in talks of a megaround that would increase that valuation by at least 150%. IVP and NEA were said to be looking at participating in the new round. It was just in January the company raised a $73.6 million Series B led by IVP that valued it at $520 million.
9. Midi Health, $60M, healthcare: Los Altos, California-based Midi Health, a virtual care clinic for women, closed a $60 million Series B led by Emerson Collective. Founded in 2021, Midi Health has raised $100 million to date, per the company.
10. Givebutter, $50M, CRM: Austin, Texas-based Givebutter, a platform for nonprofit fundraising and CRM, announced it has closed a $50 million strategic growth investment led by BVP Forge. Founded in 2016, the company has raised $57 million, per Crunchbase.
There were not really any large rounds outside the U.S. this week. The biggest came from the Emerald Isle.
We tracked the largest announced rounds in the Crunchbase database that were raised by U.S.-based companies for the seven-day period of April 20 to 26. Although most announced rounds are represented in the database, there could be a small time lag as some rounds are reported late in the week.
Illustration: Dom Guzman
Stay up to date with recent funding rounds, acquisitions, and more with the Crunchbase Daily.
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The Week's 10 Biggest Funding Rounds: Xaira And Other AI Startups Have Huge Week - Crunchbase News
Baltimore coach allegedly used AI voice cloning to get principal fired – The Verge
A physical education teacher and former athletic director of a Baltimore County high school has been arrested and charged with using an AI voice cloning service to frame the schools principal.
The Baltimore Banner reports that Baltimore County police believe a recording that circulated on social media in January with purported audio of Pikesville High School principal Eric Eiswert making racist and antisemitic comments was fake. Experts told The Baltimore Banner and police that the recording, which briefly resulted in Eiswerts suspension, has a flat tone, unusually clean background sounds, and lack of consistent breathing sounds or pauses.
Baltimore County police traced the recording to Dazhon Darien, a former athletic director at the school whose name was also mentioned in the audio clip. He allegedly used school computers to access OpenAI tools and Microsoft Bing Chat services, as reported by WBAL-TV 11 and NBC News. He was also linked to the audios release via an email address and associated recovery phone number.
It is not clear what AI voice platform Darien allegedly used.
The police arrested Darien on Thursday at the airport and said in a statement, Its believed Mr. Darien, who was an Athletic Director at Pikesville High School, made the recording to retaliate against Mr. Eiswert who at the time was pursuing an investigation into the potential mishandling of school funds. He has been released after posting bail and faces charges including theft (for the issue with school funds), disturbing the operations of a school, retaliation against a witness, and stalking.
In this fraught environment, OpenAI decided in March to withhold its AI text-to-voice generation platform, Voice Engine, from public use. The service, which only requires a 15-minute audio clip to clone someones voice, is only available to a limited number of researchers due to the lack of guardrails around the technology.
US lawmakers have filed, but not yet passed, several bills like the No Fakes Act and the No AI Fraud Act that seek to prevent technology companies from using an individuals face, voice, or name without their permission.
Update, April 25th: Clarified that Pikesville High School is in the city of Pikesville in Baltimore County, Maryland, and added details about Darien and Thursdays arrest.
The rest is here:
Baltimore coach allegedly used AI voice cloning to get principal fired - The Verge
A National Security Insider Does the Math on the Dangers of AI – WIRED
One type of risk youve been very interested in for a long time is biorisk. Whats the worst thing that could possibly happen? Take us through that.
I started out in public health before I worked in national security, working on infectious disease controlmalaria and tuberculosis. In 2002, the first virus was synthesized from scratch on a Darpa project, and it was sort of an oh crap moment for the biosciences and the public health community, realizing biology is going to become an engineering discipline that could be potentially misused. I was working with veterans of the smallpox eradication campaign, and they thought, Crap, we just spent decades eradicating a disease that now could be synthesized from scratch.
There's a lot of vulnerability in society. Covid was a demonstration of this.
Jason Matheny
I then moved to working in biosecurity, trying to figure out, How could we increase the security around biolabs so that they're less likely to be used? How can we detect biological weapons programs? Which, unfortunately, still exist in significant numbers in a few places in the world. Also, how can we bake more security into society so that we're more resilient when it comes not only to an engineered pandemic but also natural pandemics?
There's a lot of vulnerability that remains in society. Covid was a demonstration of this. This was a relatively mild virus in historic termsit had an infection fatality rate less than 1 percentwhereas there are some natural viruses that have fatality rates well above 50 percent. There are synthetic viruses that have close to 100 percent lethality while still being as transmissible as SARS-CoV-2. Even though we know how to design vaccines and manufacture them very quickly, getting them approved takes about as much time today as it did about 20 years ago. So the amount of time that you would need in order to vaccinate a population is about the same today as it was for our parents and even for our grandparents.
When I first started getting interested in biosecurity in 2002, it cost many millions of dollars to construct a poliovirus, a very, very small virus. It would've cost close to $1 billion to synthesize a pox virus, a very large virus. Today, the cost is less than $100,000, so it's a 10,000-fold decrease over that period. Meanwhile, vaccines have actually tripled in cost over that period. The defense-offense asymmetry is moving in the wrong direction.
And what do you see as our greatest adversary in biorisks?
First is nature. The evolution of natural viruses continues. We're going to have future viral pandemics. Some of them are going to be worse than Covid, some of them are going to be not as bad as Covid, but we've got to be resilient to both. Covid cost just the US economy more than $10 trillion, and yet what we invest in preventing the next pandemic is maybe $2 billion to $3 billion of federal investment.
Another category is intentional biological attacks. Aum Shinrikyo was a doomsday cult in Japan that had a biological weapons program. They believed that they would be fulfilling prophecy by killing everybody on the planet. Fortunately, they were working with 1990s biology, which wasn't that sophisticated. Unfortunately, they then turned to chemical weapons and launched the Tokyo sarin gas attacks.
The barrier to entry for somebody who wants to carry out a biological attack is eroding.
Jason Matheny
We have individuals and groups today that have mass-casualty intent and increasingly express interest in biology as a weapon. What's preventing them from being able to use biology effectively are not controls on the tools or the raw materials, because those are all now available in many laboratories and on eBayyou can buy a DNA synthesizer for much less than $100,000 now. You can get all the materials and consumables that you need from most scientific supply stores.
What an apocalyptic group would lack is the know-how to turn those tools into a biological weapon. Theres a concern that AI makes the know-how more widely available. Some of the research done by [AI safety and research company] Anthropic has looked at risk assessments to see if these tools could be misused by somebody who didn't have a strong bio background. Could they basically get graduate-level training from a digital tutor in the form of a large language model? Right now, probably not. But if you map the progress over the last couple of years, the barrier to entry for somebody who wants to carry out a biological attack is eroding.
Original post:
A National Security Insider Does the Math on the Dangers of AI - WIRED
Police: Purported recording of principal contained AI content – WBAL TV Baltimore
ABOUT THIS DISTURBING CASE. IT FEELS LIKE REALLY UNCOMFORTABLE. ITS LIKE THE ENVIRONMENT AT THE SCHOOL JUST STARTS TO FEEL HOSTILE, MORE AND MORE LIKE EVERY DAY IM HERE. PIKESVILLE HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS ARE FRUSTRATED WITH THE SCANDAL AMONGST THEIR SCHOOL LEADERS. THEYVE ALL HEARD THE AUDIO CLIP THAT SOUNDS LIKE THEYRE NOW REMOVED. PIKESVILLE HIGH SCHOOL PRINCIPAL ERIC EISWERTH. THE CLIP, POSTED TO SOCIAL MEDIA, INCLUDES RACIST AND ANTI-SEMITIC INSULTS ABOUT STUDENTS. NOW, COUNTY LEADERS BELIEVE IT WAS A AI GENERATED FROM THE VERY BEGINNING. WE HAVE EXPRESSED OUR CONCERN ABOUT THE DISTURBING AUDIO THAT SHOOK OUR COMMUNITIES HERE IN BALTIMORE COUNTY, DETECTIVES FOUND FORMER ATHLETIC DIRECTOR 31 YEAR OLD DAYS ON DARIAN TO BE RESPONSIBLE FOR THE CLIP. BELIEVED TO BE RETALIATION. AFTER FINDING OUT HIS CONTRACT WOULD NOT BE RENEWED AFTER TERMINATING A COACH WITHOUT APPROVAL AND ALLEGEDLY PAYING TEACHERS UNDER THE TABLE FOR HELPING HIM WITH HIS JOB, WHICH IS THE SUBJECT OF AN INTERNAL AUDIT. I AM UNABLE TO GET INTO SPECIFIC PERSONNEL DETAILS. I CAN TELL YOU THAT WE ARE EXPLORING ADMINISTRATIVE CHANGES, GIVEN THE IMMENSE IMPACT OF THIS INCIDENT ON THE PIKESVILLE HIGH SCHOOL, SCHOOL COMMUNITY AND THE ONGOING LOCAL, NATIONAL AND INTERNATIONAL COVERAGE. CHARGING DOCUMENT STATE THAT AN EDUCATOR ADMITTED TO POLICE. SHE SENT THE CLIP TO NEWS OUTLETS AND A STUDENT WHO SHE KNEW WOULD SPREAD THE CLIP AROUND. DARIAN ORIGINALLY DENIED INVOLVEMENT, BUT POLICE HAVE NOW CONNECTED THE EMAIL ADDRESS THAT SENT OUT THE AUDIO CLIP TO DARIENS GRANDMOTHERS HOME IN LA, WITH THE RECOVERY PHONE NUMBER BEING DARIENS PHONE. POLICE ALSO HAD MULTIPLE EXPERTS CONFIRMED TRACES OF AI WITH HUMAN EDITING IN THE CLIP, AND FOUND THAT DARIAN HAD EVEN USED THE SCHOOL NETWORK TO SEARCH FOR AI TOOLS. ALL THIS LEADING TO HIS ARREST AT BWI. WHEN ATTEMPTING TO BOARD A FLIGHT THURSDAY MORNING. HES NOW CHARGED WITH THEFT, DISRUPTION OF SCHOOL ACTIVITIES, RETALIATION, AND STALKING. MEANTIME, THE INVESTIGATION INTO THE OTHER EDUCATORS POSSIBLY INVOLVED THAT IS ONGOING AT PIKESVIL
Police: Purported recording of Pikesville HS principal was not authentic, contained AI content
School's former athletic director arrested at BWI-Marshall Airport on open warrant
Updated: 6:08 PM EDT Apr 25, 2024
The former athletic director at Pikesville High School has been arrested in connection to an AI-generated impersonation of the school's principal.Dazhon Darien, 31, faces multiple charges, including stalking, theft, disruption of school operations, and retaliation against a witness, according to charging documents obtained by 11 News.The investigationPolice said the charges are connected to an investigation that started on Jan. 17 into a voice recording circulated on social media that was alleged to have been the voice of the school's principal, Eric Eiswert.Police said the audio clip, which was an alleged race-based commentary on the school's students and teachers, was spread on social media. That led to the temporary removal of Eiswert from the school, as well as many hate-filled messages on social media and numerous calls to the school."From the very beginning, we have expressed our concern about the disturbing audio that shook our communities here in Baltimore County," Baltimore County Executive Johnny Olszewski said.Police: Recording was not authenticPolice said Thursday afternoon that detectives have conclusive evidence based on a forensic analysis by the FBI that the recording was not authentic. Police said the analysis indicated the recording contained traces of AI-generated content. Detectives then sought an additional analysis by the University of California, Berkley, which arrived at the same findings as the FBI's analysis.Police said investigators believe Darien made the recording to retaliate against Eiswert, who, at the time, was pursuing an investigation into the potential mishandling of school funds. From the day the audio clip went out, Eiswert told detectives he had an idea of who was behind it. The charging documents state that Eiswert believed Darien was responsible for the clip because he believed Darien was tech-savvy and familiar with AI, and a grievance was fueled by Darien's contract not being renewed due to work-performance issues that included terminating a coach without approval and allegedly paying teachers under the table for helping him with his job, which is the subject of an internal audit."While I am unable to get into specific personnel details, we are exploring administrative changes given the immense impact of this incident on the Pikesville High School community and the local, national and international coverage," Baltimore County Public Schools Superintendent Myriam Rogers said.Video below: Full news conferencePolice said Darien had used the school network to search for AI tools. While Darien originally denied involvement, police have since connected an email address that sent out the audio clip to Darien's grandmother's home in Los Angeles that has a recovery phone number being Darien's own cellphone.Others were involvedPolice said the audio clip was originally sent to a friend group of three teachers. One of the educators admitted to police she sent the clip to news outlets and a student who she knew would spread the clip.An investigation into the other teachers involved continues.Baltimore County leaders addressed the scandal in the school district in a news conference Thursday afternoon."As you can imagine, this has been a very difficult time for Pikesville High School community, Principal Eiswert and his family and team BCPS," Rogers said.Pikesville students expressed frustration with the scandal amongst their school leaders."It feels really uncomfortable. The environment at the school starts to feel hostile more and more every day as I'm here," said Julian Solomon, a Pikesville senior.Defendant arrested at airportDarien was apprehended Thursday at Baltimore-Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport, while he was en route to Houston."Officers with the Maryland Transportation Authority took Mr. Darien into custody this morning at BWI-Thurgood Marshall Airport as he was attempting to board a flight," Baltimore County Police Chief Robert McCullough said.The police chief could not say whether Darien was attempting to flee."He could have been simply going there for other purposes," McCullough said.The chief did say Darien had a firearm, which alerted Maryland Transportation Authority police because of the way the firearm was packaged for transport. MDTA police then detained Darien after discovering the warrant out for his arrest in the Pikesville case. Prosecutor: This appears to be a first-of-its-kind caseBaltimore County State's Attorney Scott Shellenberger said the case appears to one of the first of its kind nationwide that his office was able to find. He said the Maryland General Assembly may need to update state laws to catch up with the nefarious possibilities of the new technology. For example, the charge of disrupting school activities "only carries a six-month sentence," Shellenberger said. "But we also need to take a broader look at how this technology can be used and abused to harm other people."Following a court appearance Thursday afternoon, Darien was released on a $5,000 unsecured bond. A check of online court records for Darien did not list an attorney who might be able to speak on his behalf Thursday.BCPS statementBaltimore County Public Schools sent an email to its community, which follows below.I am writing to provide an important update on the Pikesville High School investigation. This morning, Baltimore County police officers arrested Dazhon Darien, the Pikesville High School athletic director, on multiple charges stemming from an investigation the Baltimore County Police Department launched in reference to the Jan. 17, 2024, release of an audio recording allegedly of Principal Eric Eiswert. This afternoon, I joined the county executive, chief of police, and the state's attorney for a joint press conference so that the police could provide an update on the investigation and I could address next steps for the Pikesville High School community and Team BCPS. When we were made aware of the recording, we immediately launched an investigation and solicited the help of the county executive, Baltimore County police, and additional external experts. Baltimore County police enlisted the services of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. We collaborated with these partners because they have the resources and skill to determine the authenticity of the recording, and they have verified that Mr. Darien used artificial intelligence to create the audio recording. In light of today's announcement by the police department and as required by state education law we are taking appropriate action regarding Mr. Darien's conduct, up to and including a recommendation for termination. We have also been made aware that other BCPS employees are named in the charging documents. The BCPS Office of Human Resources will follow all system procedures for investigating their involvement and we will take swift action in alignment with their rights under the established collective bargaining agreement, board policy and state law.We want to thank County Executive Johnny Olszewski, Chief of Police Robert McCullough, State's Attorney Scott Shellenberger and our law enforcement partners for their work over the last several months. While law enforcement investigated, our focus as a system remained on providing direct support to Pikesville High School students and staff and creating safe spaces for them to process this incident, while maintaining our unwavering commitment to teaching and learning. This has been a difficult time for the Pikesville High School community, Principal Eiswert and his family and Team BCPS. We are proud of the students and staff and how they have stepped up to support one another. As I stated previously, the statements that were made in the recording do not reflect the core values of our system. We are proud of the diversity of Baltimore County Public Schools and strive to ensure that each member of Team BCPS feels valued and has a sense of belonging.We can now shift our focus to moving forward and providing all parties with a fresh start. While we are unable to provide specific personnel-related details, it is important to note that we are exploring administrative changes given the immense impact of this incident on the Pikesville High School community and the ongoing local, national and international coverage. To ensure continuity for our students, Mrs. Kyria Joseph, executive director of high schools, and Dr. George Roberts, consulting administrator, will continue to serve the Pikesville High School community as lead administrators for the remainder of the school year. We will work with Principal Eiswert and the Pikesville community concerning next school year.BCPS student support services team members will be available Friday, April 25, 2024, and on Monday, April 28, 2024, to engage Pikesville High School students in conversations as they process this information. We also encourage parents and families to engage in an open dialogue with their children.Resources to support parents and families include:Assisting parents caregivers in coping with collective traumas (PDF)Resources that are available to BCPS staff and the community:BCPS Employee Assistance ProgramTalkspace: Free online therapy for high school students in BaltimoreBaltimore County Crisis Response: Call 410-931-2214National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: Call 988Crisis text line: Text the word "HOME" to 741741 for free 24-hour support211 Maryland: Call 211We also want to encourage Pikesville High School students to speak with school support staff (i.e., counselors, social worker, psychologist) and trusted adults. Parents and caretakers are welcome to reach out to staff if they need support for their student. Thank you for your patience and support as we worked through the investigative process with law enforcement. We hope that today's update can provide some sense of closure to the community, and we look forward to our continued partnership to ensure the Pikesville High School community and Team BCPS end this school year strong.The Associated Press contributed to this report.
The former athletic director at Pikesville High School has been arrested in connection to an AI-generated impersonation of the school's principal.
Dazhon Darien, 31, faces multiple charges, including stalking, theft, disruption of school operations, and retaliation against a witness, according to charging documents obtained by 11 News.
Police said the charges are connected to an investigation that started on Jan. 17 into a voice recording circulated on social media that was alleged to have been the voice of the school's principal, Eric Eiswert.
Police said the audio clip, which was an alleged race-based commentary on the school's students and teachers, was spread on social media. That led to the temporary removal of Eiswert from the school, as well as many hate-filled messages on social media and numerous calls to the school.
"From the very beginning, we have expressed our concern about the disturbing audio that shook our communities here in Baltimore County," Baltimore County Executive Johnny Olszewski said.
Police said Thursday afternoon that detectives have conclusive evidence based on a forensic analysis by the FBI that the recording was not authentic. Police said the analysis indicated the recording contained traces of AI-generated content. Detectives then sought an additional analysis by the University of California, Berkley, which arrived at the same findings as the FBI's analysis.
Police said investigators believe Darien made the recording to retaliate against Eiswert, who, at the time, was pursuing an investigation into the potential mishandling of school funds.
From the day the audio clip went out, Eiswert told detectives he had an idea of who was behind it. The charging documents state that Eiswert believed Darien was responsible for the clip because he believed Darien was tech-savvy and familiar with AI, and a grievance was fueled by Darien's contract not being renewed due to work-performance issues that included terminating a coach without approval and allegedly paying teachers under the table for helping him with his job, which is the subject of an internal audit.
"While I am unable to get into specific personnel details, we are exploring administrative changes given the immense impact of this incident on the Pikesville High School community and the local, national and international coverage," Baltimore County Public Schools Superintendent Myriam Rogers said.
Video below: Full news conference
Police said Darien had used the school network to search for AI tools. While Darien originally denied involvement, police have since connected an email address that sent out the audio clip to Darien's grandmother's home in Los Angeles that has a recovery phone number being Darien's own cellphone.
Police said the audio clip was originally sent to a friend group of three teachers. One of the educators admitted to police she sent the clip to news outlets and a student who she knew would spread the clip.
An investigation into the other teachers involved continues.
Baltimore County leaders addressed the scandal in the school district in a news conference Thursday afternoon.
"As you can imagine, this has been a very difficult time for Pikesville High School community, Principal Eiswert and his family and team BCPS," Rogers said.
Pikesville students expressed frustration with the scandal amongst their school leaders.
"It feels really uncomfortable. The environment at the school starts to feel hostile more and more every day as I'm here," said Julian Solomon, a Pikesville senior.
Darien was apprehended Thursday at Baltimore-Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport, while he was en route to Houston.
"Officers with the Maryland Transportation Authority took Mr. Darien into custody this morning at BWI-Thurgood Marshall Airport as he was attempting to board a flight," Baltimore County Police Chief Robert McCullough said.
The police chief could not say whether Darien was attempting to flee.
"He could have been simply going there for other purposes," McCullough said.
The chief did say Darien had a firearm, which alerted Maryland Transportation Authority police because of the way the firearm was packaged for transport. MDTA police then detained Darien after discovering the warrant out for his arrest in the Pikesville case.
Baltimore County State's Attorney Scott Shellenberger said the case appears to one of the first of its kind nationwide that his office was able to find. He said the Maryland General Assembly may need to update state laws to catch up with the nefarious possibilities of the new technology.
For example, the charge of disrupting school activities "only carries a six-month sentence," Shellenberger said. "But we also need to take a broader look at how this technology can be used and abused to harm other people."
Following a court appearance Thursday afternoon, Darien was released on a $5,000 unsecured bond. A check of online court records for Darien did not list an attorney who might be able to speak on his behalf Thursday.
Baltimore County Public Schools sent an email to its community, which follows below.
Resources to support parents and families include:
Resources that are available to BCPS staff and the community:
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Excerpt from:
Police: Purported recording of principal contained AI content - WBAL TV Baltimore
Adobe’s impressive AI upscaling project makes blurry videos look HD – The Verge
Adobe researchers have developed a new generative AI model called VideoGigaGAN that can upscale blurry videos at up to eight times their original resolution. Introduced in a paper published on April 18th, Adobe claims VideoGigaGAN is superior to other Video Super Resolution (VSR) methods as it can provide more fine-grained details without introducing any AI weirdness to the footage.
In a nutshell, Generative Adversarial Networks (GANs) are effective for upscaling still images to a higher resolution, but struggle to do the same for video without introducing flickering and other unwanted artifacts. Other upscaling methods can avoid this, but the results arent as sharp or detailed. VideoGigaGAN aims to provide the best of both worlds the higher image/video quality of GAN models, with fewer flickering or distortion issues across output frames. The company has provided several examples here that show its work in full resolution.
Some of the finer details in the demo clips Adobe provided appear to be entirely artificial, such as the skin texture and creases in the below example, but the results appear impressively natural. It would be difficult to tell that generative AI was used to improve the resolution, which could extend the what is a photo debate to include video.
This is only a research preview, so theres no guarantee that Adobe will make VideoGigaGAN available to consumers via Creative Cloud software like Premiere Pro. The company previously previewed a separate diffusion-based upsampling experiment, Project Res-Up, during its MAX event in October 2023, which similarly improves the quality of low-resolution GIFs and video footage. And Adobe isnt alone in this work, as both Microsoft and Nvidia have also developed their own VSR upscaling technology.
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Adobe's impressive AI upscaling project makes blurry videos look HD - The Verge
What if you used AI to project a Cincinnati Bengals NFL draft board? – The Cincinnati Enquirer
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What if you used AI to project a Cincinnati Bengals NFL draft board? - The Cincinnati Enquirer
Best Buy will use AI to help customers, cuts costs with layoffs – USA TODAY
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Best Buy will use AI to help customers, cuts costs with layoffs - USA TODAY
Google will provide AI to the military for disaster response – The Washington Post
SAN FRANCISCO Google on Wednesday said it is providing artificial intelligence tools to help the National Guard analyze images of disaster areas so it can respond to them faster and more effectively.
Bellwether, a new group inside X, the innovation lab that is part of Googles parent company Alphabet, has developed tech that can ingest photos taken at an angle by airplanes, compare them with satellite imagery and maps, and automatically identify locations, roads, buildings and other important infrastructure. Bellwether has been testing the tech with the National Guard, which will deploy it in time for the summer wildfire season, said Nirav Patel, a program manager with the Defense Innovation Unit (DIU), a Pentagon unit that helps the military integrate commercial technology and that helped organize the partnership.
Up until now, the National Guard which coordinates the militarys response to tornadoes, floods, earthquakes and wildfires inside the United States and its territories has had to rely on human analysts poring over aerial photos to figure out specifically which areas, buildings and infrastructure have been damaged after a disaster before being able to direct the right resources to the right places.
What used to take hours or days now takes just seconds, said Patel. He said he expects the tech to only become more important. As climate change is impacting different parts of the Earths surface, the [Defense Department] is being pulled in, Patel said. We unfortunately only see that increasing.
The collaboration between Bellwether and the National Guard shows how Silicon Valley is working more closely with the Defense Department. Though military funding and the space program were integral to getting Silicon Valley up and running in the 1950s and 1960s, few tech founders in recent decades have built companies with the goal of serving the military. The DIU was set up in 2015 to try to close that gap and find a way to cut through bureaucratic procurement processes and get the tech industry to work more closely with the Defense Department.
More recently, a new wave of Silicon Valley tech companies, including drone maker Anduril and AI company Shield AI, have begun building tech specifically for the military, casting themselves as patriots aiming to arm the U.S. military to retain its dominance through the 21st century. Venture-capital funding for defense tech start-ups is growing.
Google has a complicated history with the U.S. military. In 2018, the company walked away from a contract to build AI image-recognition tools for the Pentagon after employees protested the deal. But since then, it has steadily returned to military work and was one of four companies awarded a massive $9 billion contract to build cloud services for the Defense Department.
Spokespeople for both the DIU and Google X said that the AI would only be used domestically within the United States and its territories, and for disaster response, not military action.
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Google will provide AI to the military for disaster response - The Washington Post
Stability AI is giving more developers access to its next-gen text-to-image generator – The Verge
The next generation of the text-to-image AI model Stable Diffusion is still in preview, but Stability AI is making it available to some developers via API and a new content creation platform. Stability AI says developers can now access Stable Diffusion 3 from its Developer Platform.
Stability AI says its working with API platform Fireworks AI for companies that want to use both models. It also plans on hosting its model weights on its own servers through a Stability AI membership in the near future.
The company released Stable Diffusion 3 in February to a small number of developers on preview. Stability AI says Stable Diffusion 3 is equal to or outperforms other text-to-image generators, like OpenAIs DALL-E 3 and Midjourney v6, in typography and prompt adherence. The model uses an architecture called Multimodal Diffusion Transformer, which is supposed to improve text understanding and spelling.
Stability AI also announced a new platform for creating content called Stable Assistant Beta, where Stable Diffusion 3 and other models will be available. The company says Stable Assistant Beta is a friendly chatbot where paying subscribers can access its latest models to generate images, write content, or help match photos to text through conversation. Stable Assistant Beta is not open to the public yet, but the company invited a small number of users to try an early access release version.
Despite being made available through the API and Stable Assistant Beta, Stability AI says both Stable Diffusion 3 models remain under preview and are not yet available to the general public. The company says it expanded access to the models so it can collaborate with its community to improve them, but it has taken and continues to take reasonable steps to prevent the misuse of Stable Diffusion 3 by bad actors.
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Stability AI is giving more developers access to its next-gen text-to-image generator - The Verge