The US military is testing an artificial intelligence (AI) tool to spot deepfakes and misleading information.
Dubbed Data Robot, the technology is expected to bolster the information warfare capabilities of US armed forces amid adversaries’ increasing propaganda campaigns.
According to US Army cyber director Col. Brett Riddle, the primary objective of the new tool is to provide an “overlay” of correct information to help commanders make better decisions on the battlefield.
“So, what we asked Data Robot to do is… can you create that overlay for us using information from open source?” he said, as quoted by Breaking Defense. “And can we use some military systems to help take that open-source information and provide it to a [command post]?”
Riddle explained that the US military is still working on technical issues with Data Robot, including how massive amounts of data could be safely stored.
However, he said that “promising work” has already been done, and the AI tool is showing significant progress.
A ‘Critical’ Capability
The ability to quickly discern factual information from fake news has proven crucial for military units on today’s battlefield.
Ukraine, for example, was targeted by a misinformation campaign when a manipulated video of President Volodymyr Zelensky calling on his soldiers to surrender went viral online.
With Data Robot, Washington is expected to gain a technical and tactical advantage before, during, and after battles.
“You know, social media in the Indo-Pacific doesn’t look like social media in the United States,” Riddle explained. “But then once trained over the 90-day period, it was effective at determining tweets that emanated from bots.”
The new tech reportedly needs 90 days of data from an operating environment before effectively identifying deepfakes and misleading content.