Let’s face it: technology is both a boon and a bane. With the proliferation of AI-generated and deep-fake images, it’s becoming increasingly difficult to tell which photos are real. Here’s where digital forensics experts like Hany Farid come into the picture.

In the video above, Farid gives a TED talk about how he helps journalists, courts and governments find structural errors in AI-generated images. He also extends his expertise to everyday individuals, offering four practical tips that they can use in the reality that he accurately describes as “the internet’s war on reality.”

Farid also shares that with his training as an applied mathematician and computer scientist, he has spent the last 30 years developing technologies to authenticate digital images and videos for a variety of cases. What used to be a monthly occurrence has become an everyday matter for him.

He attributes this escalation to a combination of things, particularly generative AI and largely unregulated social media. “We now have the ability to create images that are almost indistinguishable from reality… social media dominates the world and is largely unregulated, and actively promotes and amplifies lies and conspiracies over the truth.,” he notes.

While image manipulation has been around since the early days of photography, the advancement of technology has made it easier and easier to do for anyone, anywhere, at a touch of a button.

So, as photographers, what are your thoughts on this matter? Drop them in the comments below and let’s have a discussion.