As the internet witnesses a surge in deepfake videos and the government steps in, asking online platforms like Google, Facebook, and Youtube to take down deepfakes within 24 hours of complaint, the country’s top police brass is expected to brainstorm on threats from advancements in artificial intelligence mechanisms that blur the line between real and fake.
Whether it is used against political adversaries, heads of adversary nations or to manipulate media and mislead the public, there is a growing concern within the security establishment about battling the new threat in cyber space.
In the first week of January, when police chiefs of all states and central intelligence and law enforcement agencies gather in Jaipur for the annual police conference, the rising threats from cyber world, especially the impact of deepfakes, is expected to be discussed to create a roadmap for police agencies in 2024.
A number of state police forces have been stressing the need to develop an indigenous framework to reduce dependency on vendors from foreign nations, which can help develop an Atma Nirbhar Bharat policy in cyber forensic tools and also create more trust in data protection law.
A senior security official said deepfakes have the potential to create a zero-trust society as AI algorithms are used to artificially produce, manipulate, and modify media—either audio or visual—of real persons and its impact can cause serious concerns. Already, deepfakes are used as 'revenge porn’, a criminal offence, where sexual or private images are shared without consent and manipulated to create falsified imagery, he said.
The legal challenges of identifying deepfakes and categorising them under the IT Act and extending them beyond privacy laws to data protection law would be the next challenge after the law enforcement and criminal aspects are discussed threadbare by the police forces. At the same time, the annual meet, which will be attended by DGPs of all states and Union territories and central police organisations, will also brainstorm on how to tackle the dark web which has grown exponentially to disguise criminal activities of organised gangs demanding immediate attention of states for capacity building and coordinated action.
