I’m finally able to share with you my talk from O’Reilly Velocity Con! I was so honored to have been selected to speak at such a prestigious event. A fully packed room and a few good laughs were had. It was a great time — even though the air conditioning AND power were out in my hotel for the first 2 days I was there!!!!!

Title: Deepfakes: If anything can be real then nothing is real.

Talk recorded at: O’Reilly Velocity Conference 2019

Abstract: “I didn’t say that!” The world will be forever changed by deepfakes. A portmanteau of “deep learning” and “fake,” this trend refers to a new AI-assisted human image-synthesis technique that generates realistic video face swaps that can even be done in real-time. With modern face-swapping video technology, selfies can be used to create videos. A voice can be faked. A face can be faked. This is the new reality. What happens when we cannot trust what we hear and what we see? How do we detect and defeat this threat to global society? April Wright explores the possible ramifications of deepfakes, from privacy violations to personal and professional embarrassment to causing global thermonuclear war, and considers what can be done to protect ourselves—emphasizing the need for remaining critical of what we see as this technology gets better and better.

Let me know your thoughts!