A new application that promises to be the "Photoshop of speech" is raising ethical and security concerns. Adobe unveiled Project Voco last week. The software makes it possible to take an audio recording and rapidly alter it to include words and phrases the original speaker never uttered, in what sounds like their voice.
One expert warned that the tech could further undermine trust in journalism. Another said it could pose a security threat. However, the US software firm says it is taking action to address such risks.
[...] "It seems that Adobe's programmers were swept along with the excitement of creating something as innovative as a voice manipulator, and ignored the ethical dilemmas brought up by its potential misuse," he told the BBC. "Inadvertently, in its quest to create software to manipulate digital media, Adobe has [already] drastically changed the way we engage with evidential material such as photographs.
"This makes it hard for lawyers, journalists, and other professionals who use digital media as evidence.
"In the same way that Adobe's Photoshop has faced legal backlash after the continued misuse of the application by advertisers, Voco, if released commercially, will follow its predecessor with similar consequences."
The risks extend beyond people being fooled into thinking others said something they did not. Banks and other businesses have started using voiceprint checks to verify customers are who they say they are when they phone in. One cybersecurity researcher said the companies involved had long anticipated something like Adobe's invention.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 24 2016, @10:03PM
If Adobe can do it, then spooks have probably had the ability to do it for years.
Give it a few more years and there will be a GNU version.
The only fix is to start doing crypto-signatures on all audio and video. And while some might argue that not having a signature is better because it gives you plausible deniability, it also makes it that much easier to indict you in the court of public opinion. As Winston Churchill said, "A lie gets halfway around the world before the truth has a chance to get its pants on."
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 24 2016, @10:59PM
I can't remember which sci-fi movie it was, but it had a speech from a former POTUS which was altered to say something about UFOs. DC was making a stink about it because it was so accurate.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 24 2016, @11:37PM
Contact: http://mentalfloss.com/article/68241/why-film-contact-annoyed-bill-clinton [mentalfloss.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 24 2016, @11:06PM
Uh-oh, "signatures" will be abused to enforce DRM on every sound bite and clip. Adobe should be marched out and shot for creating this.
(Score: 2) by sjames on Thursday November 24 2016, @11:29PM
It's been doable for decades. I even managed a somewhat crude job of it with the old original soundblaster card on a '386.
The Adobe product just automates it.