AI deepfake video of actress Rashmika Mandana going viral; Amitabh Bachchan demands legal action

Digital Desk: Deepfake technology is one of the downsides of the rapidly developing field of AI. Cybercriminals can use it to edit videos to look genuine in addition to changing their voices to resemble someone else. The actress Rashmika Mandana is the most recent victim of deepfake.

Recently, a video went viral on the internet that purported to show actress Rashmika Mandanna entering a lift has gone viral. But when you look closer, you can see that it's a digitally manipulated video called a deepfake. Millions of people have viewed the deception because it is so convincing, it has received over 2.4 million views on the social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter.

When journalist Abhishek Kumar posted the video on X, he raised concerns about the necessity of new laws and regulations to stop the spread of fake content online. The first video, which featured a woman by the name of Zara Patel, was posted on Instagram on October 8. Patel's involvement in the deepfake video's development is not supported by any evidence. Who made the fictitious video and why they did it are still unknown. 

Unfortunately, this is not an isolated incidence; in recent years, similar fake videos have targeted celebrities from different fields.

Bollywood icon Amitabh Bachchan also tweeted about the video, stating that the deepfakes are a "strong case for legal action."

There is a noticeable difference between the two videos if you play them side by side—the actual footage and the deepfake. Zara Patel's face is clear in the actual video as she steps into the lift. The video, however, after just a brief second, the video transforms, morphing into the face of Rashmika Mandanna. Rashmika, a well-known actress in Indian film, rose to prominence in 2016 and has since won numerous accolades.

Deepfake is a kind of artificial intelligence (AI)-generated media in which a person's appearance or video is altered to someone else's likeness. Although content manipulation is not new, deepfakes use advanced machine learning and artificial intelligence techniques to create and modify visual and audio content that has the potential to be misleading.

A common way to identify a deepfake is to notice unusual facial expressions or movements, including blinking too frequently or insufficiently, or stiffly or jerkily. One may tell if a video is authentic or not by looking at the eyes. The eyes of deepfakes are frequently blurry or unfocused, or they may not match their head motions.