Deepfake clips of Gareth Southgate swearing at England team go viral

The Gareth Southgate we're seeing in the blog is not the usual calm and collected version that everyone knows. In the world of online humor, this different side of him is most likely intentional.

Shortly after England won the semi-final against the Netherlands and the team left the field, fake videos of the team manager started appearing on social media. These videos showed the manager using strong language and expressing opinions that were not typical of him.

"I really fooled them today," jokes a fake Southgate in a video on TikTok following England's exciting win in the semi-finals against the Dutch. Using AI technology, these videos mimic Southgate's voice and move his mouth to match the audio. We can expect to see more of these videos after the final on Sunday, regardless of the outcome.

The manager of England is commonly seen as a symbol of the country, but in this instance, he represents a popular online trend known as the deepfake meme.

Similar to how photo editing was used in the past, fake videos created using artificial intelligence (AI) called deepfakes are now a popular tool for creating humorous content on the internet.

According to Bahareh Heravi, a professor at the Institute for People-Centred AI at the University of Surrey, deepfakes are becoming the new standard for digitally manipulated content. She explains that individuals can now utilize advanced AI tools to produce content that is comparable to what was previously created with software like Photoshop and video editing tools. These tools now offer enhanced capabilities for generating video and audio, setting a new standard for digital manipulation.

On the basic side, there are apps that allow people to easily swap faces in videos, which was a big technological advancement in 2018. Some recent examples include Rishi Sunak and Keir Starmer swapping faces to look like Del Boy and Rodney Trotter, and Noel Gallagher swapping faces to look like different Irishmen including Roy Keane. This seems to be a playful reference to the rock star's Irish background that he often mentions in interviews.

When using voice cloning tools like those offered by ElevenLabs, you can take it a step further and create a complete script for your fake celebrity to speak. If you have watched videos of British politicians pretending to be Twitch Minecraft streamers, you will see that the final products can be filled with inside jokes and references, with only occasional robotic sounding or misaligned mouths breaking the illusion.

According to professionals at Faculty AI, a company from the United Kingdom with contracts from commercial companies and the UK government to identify deepfake videos, they mention that the Southgate video shows clear signs that it is fake. These signs include the mouth movements not matching with the words being said, unnatural pauses, and strange pacing in the speech. Additionally, England fans would immediately recognize that the video is fake because Southgate would never speak negatively about his players like Harry Kane, Phil Foden, and Jack Grealish, as portrayed in the deepfake video.

Experts believe that AI-generated video deepfakes made significant progress last year, particularly with a video showcasing a Balenciaga fashion show transformed with Harry Potter actors. They warn that this type of AI-driven deception is a serious risk to society. The popular show Deepfake Neighbour Wars on ITV further demonstrated how deepfake technology is becoming more widespread, with celebrities like Idris Elba and Kim Kardashian digitally manipulated in the simulations.

Nevertheless, Faculty stated that generative AI, which refers to systems like ChatGPT or Midjourney that can create realistic text, audio, and images based on basic prompts, are advancing so rapidly that relying solely on manual detection will no longer be enough to stop the dissemination of truly harmful content.

The Football Association stated that they will work to get rid of any videos that are offensive, like they do with all inappropriate content.

The goal of these pranksters is not usually to deceive directly, but that doesn't mean their jokes can't be misleading. Online, any satire can often be mistaken for the real thing, a phenomenon known as "Poe's law" named after a commenter who observed how difficult it is to satirize extreme beliefs. Just like articles from the Onion or funny images from B3ta, viral deepfakes are often shared with comments questioning if they are real. Some of the clips of Southgate are even specifically labeled as being created using artificial intelligence.

The videos of Southgate have been very popular on social media. On YouTube, there are many fake videos of Southgate, but one deepfake video posted after the Slovakia match has gotten 390,000 views. Additionally, there are eight videos on a TikTok account dedicated to fake videos of Southgate that have collectively received over 1 million views. This TikTok account also shares a link to an eBay page where customized AI messages from Southgate are being sold. The page even offers to include swear words in the messages, if requested.

The rules on TikTok say that AI videos that look real need to be marked, and videos using a public figure's likeness can be used in funny or artistic ways. YouTube now lets people ask for deepfake videos to be taken down under certain conditions, but they will review if the video is meant to be a joke or satire before making a decision.

Public figures cannot control what is falsely associated with them, especially when it comes to audio, which lacks visual cues for detecting deepfake voices. Heravi suggests that advancements in deepfake detection tools and increased public awareness and education will help improve the situation over time.

False video is not the only area where generative AI is changing the way memes are created. Meme generators, like Glif, are now automating most of the process of creating humor. For memes with a specific format, such as "chad/virgin" or "stop doing math", users can create templates that utilize a sophisticated large language model (LLM) to generate text, an image generator for pictures, and a standardized structure to combine them all. This results in a tool that can be directed to create a meme about why one should "stop participating in football tournaments" and quickly receive the message "KICKING A BALL SHOULD NOT BE USED TO DETERMINE NATIONAL PRIDE".