How AI Deepfakes Are Complicating Disaster Response In China

As torrential rain batters China, authorities are grappling with another challenge: a surge in AI-generated deepfakes depicting floods and other disaster scenes. Beyond Typhoon Noul, officials now face the rapid spread of fabricated videos and images carrying false claims, complicating disaster response and fuelling misinformation.

Videos flooding the social media platform contain images of dead bodies floating in floodwaters, the false depiction of severe flooding in areas actually not affected and others with fake details of emergency response efforts.

In some cases, videos falsely claiming widespread power outages triggered panic buying of emergency supplies. As torrential rain batters China, authorities are grappling with another challenge: a surge in AI-generated deepfakes portraying fabricated flood scenes and spreading false information alongside the real disaster.

China’s challenge now remains not just limited to Typhoon Noul, which made landfall there, but also videos containing false depictions and information.

How Is AI Fueling Disaster Misinformation?

Other than completely fake information, videos capitalized on real-life incidents. According to BBC, floods in Hengzhou city, Guangxi in early July caused hundreds of snakes to escape from a breeding farm. Fake published later showed crocodiles also being released into a river.

China is pouring billions of dollars into building simple, accessible AI tools. The authorities which are carrying out mass evacuations and complex rescue operations, are now fearing that the technology could be used to trick people into panicking.

Why fake Disaster Videos Spread Quickly?

Experts warn that this crisis of spreading of misinformation videos could be looming.

"Many of these content creators use disaster news to try to gain followers, knowing that more sensational or exaggerated content will garner more likes and more views. They are deliberately fabricating information to grab people's attention," Huang Zhihua, Deputy Chief in charge of online public security for Zhejiang Police Department told Chinese state media, as quoted by BBC.

In recent weeks, there have been arrests and penalties, ranging from detention awaiting criminal prosecution to fines, for the creation of false reports and video content.

An article published by the newspaper of the Communist Party's Central Party School quoted Professor Chen Bin as saying, "AI dramatically lowers the technical barriers to producing false information. Individuals no longer require sophisticated technical skills.

By simply prompting AI tools, they can rapidly generate convincing text, images, audio and video… which is highly realistic but entirely fabricated content, manufactured on a large scale."

Professor Gao Fuping, from the East China University of Political Science and Law, told the BBC that motivation for the publishing of such false content ranges from those who do it "to create something amusing without thinking about the consequences", to those who want to "generate traffic for personal gain" or those who wish to deliberately "cause panic or social unrest".

"Some users think the online world is anonymous and unregulated or that they cannot be traced," he said, as quoted by BBC.

Impact On Rescue Operations And Public Trust

Professor Xu Xiaoke of Beijing Normal University told the BBC that AI-generated content needed to be stamped for geographic locations and tracking of image sources needed greater efforts.

"That said, I would also stress that detection technology still lags behind generation technology. We're in a constant cat-and-mouse game. So we should not assume that technology alone can identify AI-generated content with the click of a button," BBC quoted his as saying.

Can Authorities Keep Up?

The Chinese government in its bid to become leading tech superpower as in 2017, it announced that AI will be "the main driving force" of its progress. As the country pours more funds into AI businesses seeking more capital, BBC quoted the state media Xinhua report that they have over “6,000 AI companies.”

Xu stringently advocated that China must build "trusted information infrastructure". He suggested that this could include official government early warning systems and disaster interfaces which news organisations can access.

Xu stringently advocated that China must build "trusted information infrastructure". He suggested that this could include official government early warning systems and disaster interfaces which news organisations can access.

But here, too, another challenge emerges. The strict control of the government on the media caused downplaying of disasters. For example, as per BBC, earlier in July, local journalists were asked to "soften" their language to describe a major breach in the wall of the Liulan Dam near Naning as an "opening" or "gap".

Officials appeared to be trying to make the breach sound less alarming even as water bursting through the broken dam led to at least 26 deaths.

There have been other instances, like in 2021, local officials were arrested, accused of concealing or underreporting 139 deaths in Henan province.

Xu Warns Of AI menace

Xu told BBC that the AI-induced panic may spread and governments must prepare for it in advance.

"AI-generated misinformation is likely to increase not only in volume but in the speed with which it spreads. Looking ahead, political elections, public health emergencies, armed conflicts, natural disasters and issues affecting people's livelihoods are all likely to become high-risk areas for AI-generated misinformation. Instead of waiting for false information to go viral before trying to contain it, governments and platforms should now be preparing in advance," he told BBC.