YouTube Has a New Button to Report Deepfakes

Almost since it was unleashed upon the world, YouTube has had a way to detect people stealing audio and video. Now it’s got a new tool that scans to detect it when somebody steals your face, too.

As sick of hearing about AI as many of you are, I wearily, begrudgingly believe that AI is going to end up being the hand that helps fight other, more malevolent uses of AI.

how YouTube’s New Deepfake BUtton works

For an explainer on the new tool, let me point you temporarily to an existing tool YouTube has had since way back in 2007: Content ID.

As Google (which owns YouTube) puts it, “Using a database of audio and visual files submitted by copyright owners, Content ID identifies matches of copyright-protected content. When a video is uploaded to YouTube, it’s automatically scanned by Content ID.”

The new likeness detection tool is exactly the same, only instead of scanning for likenesses of your graphics and audio, it scans for your face. If you’re a YouTube Partner Program creator whose face (or likeness) has been copied, altered, or generated by AI, the tool will flag it and bring it to the creator’s attention.

Then the creator can request that YouTube remove the video. Creators have to first verify their identities, and then the new tool adds it to the database that gets cross-checked against every new video that somebody uploads to YouTube.

Judging from YouTube’s announcement, it doesn’t seem like YouTube will go through all the existing videos on the website and scan them when you sign up for the tool, only the ones uploaded after you verify your likeness.

From the stipulation that it’s YouTube Partner Program creators who’ll get widespread access over the coming months, it also seems that likeness detection is reserved for those creators who monetize their videos, and not just your uncle who occasionally posts videos of his Husky saying people words.