Forensics Experts Can’t Protect You in the Metaverse
Photorealistic nighttime image of a 5’10” Asian-American man dressed in all black robbing a Downtown Dallas bank captured by a security camera.
I can’t tell where we’re headed. As a forensic investigator, I’m trained to be skeptical and alarm bells are ringing.
I delivered a presentation tonight to the North Dallas Bar Association on #deepfake forensics and the #metaverse.
Whenever I deliver this specific content, I get depressed. With as much excitement as technology breeds, there is an upside-down place where danger looms.
During the Q&A session after my presentation, one Texas attorney said, “I’m scared.”
OpenAI projects like Dall-E-2 produce astonishing works of art from basic written input. I want to be bad and try: “Photorealistic nighttime image of a 5’10” Asian-American man dressed in all black robbing a Downtown Dallas bank captured by a security camera,” just to see how convincing the renderings are.
The ease with which everyday folks can try to forge evidence is crazy. I’m seeing this more frequently with creatively edited multimedia, and while I haven’t seen sophisticated forgeries of the deep fake variety on my matters yet, it’s coming.
These app-driven forgeries are designed to create superficially convincing output, but their handling of the underlying metadata is clunky at best.
These forgeries are also used commonly all around the internet in non-litigation, everyday posts and the consumers are not inclined to hire a forensic expert to authenticate the files.
Unsuspecting individuals will take this “content” at face value and fall victim to the manipulation.
Even TikTok, known as the last sunny corner on the internet due to the predominant fun-focused nature of dance routines, lip-syncing, and standup comedy clips, has a “for you page” algorithm that favors an echo chamber of content that can take you down a dark alley really quick with a few errant likes.
Influencers are creating provocative content for prestige, and they know that a factual basis for their content is not a prerequisite in today’s #Web2 world.
I’m not sure if #Web3 algorithms or legal terms of service can de-platform offenders and trolls from their Metaverse services fast enough and with enough conviction against the censorship opponents to chart a different course.
Jerry Bui is Managing Director of Digital Forensics within FTI Consulting’s Technology segment focused on forensic technology and risk & compliance issues (all opinions his own). Jerry is a Certified Fraud Examiner and has over 20 years of experience in digital forensics, ediscovery, automated risk assessments, dashboard compliance monitoring, and investigative analytics. Jerry’s team provides evidence acquisition, expert witness, and strategic consulting services to law firms and corporations. Connect with Jerry on LinkedIn, Twitter and TikTok.
The Digital Forensics Future (DFF) podcast is also available on the platforms below.
