From NPR All Things Considered
This TikTok video is fake, but every word was taken from a real creator
By Bobby Allyn, Shannon Bond
Millions of TikTokkers have watched some version of a video in the past week falsely stating that ”they’re installing incinerators at Alligator Alcatraz,” referring to an internet conspiracy theory that furnaces were being set up at a state-run immigration detention facility in the Florida Everglades, which spread widely despite having no evidence.
One of the videos circulating the rumor attracted nearly 20 million views. It spurred a conversation on TikTok, with creators weighing in with their own takes and, in a handful of instances, attempting to debunk the baseless theory...
Hany Farid, a professor at the University of California, Berkeley who studies digital forensics, said what is new here is that an average person’s words are being stolen.
“All the time, we’re seeing people’s identities being co-opted to do things like hawk crypto scams or push bogus cures for cancer, but usually it’s a famous person or influencer,” Farid said.
Farid used a digital forensic tool to analyze the copied incinerator video, the Disney cruise video and other videos posted by the same account, at NPR’s request, and concluded they were the products of AI...
Hany Farid is a professor in the Department of Electrical Engineering & Computer Sciences and the School of Information at UC Berkeley
