As seen The New York Times, Elon Musk shared a modified version of Kamala Harris’ campaign video Friday night that uses a deep fake voice to say things like, “I got elected because I’m a chief diversity officer,” in the VP’s voice. Nowhere does the post warn users that the video has been manipulated and comments Harris didn’t actually say. Under X policiesusers may not “share synthetic, manipulated, or out-of-context media that is likely to deceive or confuse people and cause harm (“misleading media”).”
The post by Sunday afternoon, it had more than 119 million views all weekend. It was originally posted by another user, @MrReaganUSA, whose post says it’s a parody. Among other things, the voice in the video says: “For four years I was under the tutelage of the last puppet of the deep state, the wonderful mentor Joe Biden.” Musk’s post, which only said “This is amazing” with a smiley emoji, was not labeled as deceptive, which the site sometimes does if it determines that certain media is, and no Community Notes were attached. NYT mentions that several proposals have been made.
Altered media is permitted to remain on the site in some cases and will not be labeled as deceptive in accordance with X’s policies. This includes memes and satire, “provided they do not cause serious confusion as to the authenticity of the media.” The potential for deep fraud to be used to sway voter opinion in the run-up to elections has been a growing concern in recent years. Earlier this year 20 technology companies signed the contract In the 2024 elections, including X.
