In the photography world last year, AI shook things up, fooling judges in competitions, and creating deepfakes which caused real-world trauma.
Deepfakes can be used for humour, or for creating and spreading misinformation. As AI generators become more powerful, it’s getting harder to pick out real images from fake ones.
According to sources, Sony, Canon and Niko are in talks to address the issue of deepfakes by building technology that will be able to verify the authenticity of images in new cameras.
Launched last year, the Leica M11-P was the first camera equipped with Content Credentials, which is a digital signature that authenticates time, date, and location and image was taken, as well as who it was taken by, and any edits made post-snap.
Now, Sony, Canon and Nikon are expected to introduce their own authentication technology.
Leica M11-P
It’s currently unknown which cameras will come with Content Credentials built-in, but there are some that are tipped to be a part of the list.
During the Sony A9 III launch, the company revealed it would update that camera, and two other pro models, with Content Provenance and Authenticity support. This is a coalition co-founded by Adobe that introduced Content Credentials.
Reports suggest future cameras will provide information needed to authenticate images for the free, publicly available Content Authenticity Initiative’s (CAI) Verify system.
With three of the largest camera brands talking about implementing anti-AI features, experts believe they will be reserved to pro cameras for journalists.
Through the Content Credentials Verify tool, large media organisations will be able to implement protocols for fact-checking, however, majority of cameras won’t be properly verified.
A larger challenge is websites and social media, where misinformation is shared. The verification measures don’t address these.
For now, it seems that it will be some time before this technology will make its way to cameras and phones on a wider scale.
It’s also unclear if misinformation spreaders will find a way to surpass these digital signatures.
