How to spot AI fake images

Donald Trump in the orange prison suitTrump as he is on the ground fallsand Trump wearing a suit by prison corridors is conducted: All of this looks real at first glance – but it is actually fake. The content was created with an image AI. The Bellingcat founder Eliot Higgins, for example, created and contributed to such AI images Twitter shared.

He was referring to Donald Trump’s own arrest. A day before it was supposed to take place, on March 20, 2023, Higgins published images that at first glance show Trump being arrested. At first they look deceptively real – the errors only become visible on closer inspection.

One picture quickly shows that it cannot be a real photo: Melania Trump is facing her husband, who is policeman dressed. It’s harder with another picture: A policeman is standing to Trumpa crowd can be seen in the background.

However, the picture shows how AI recordings can be recognized: the policeman’s hands look too long, as if they were stretched out. The patch on the jacket also catches the eye: the writing is hardly recognizable. Other letters in the background, for example on a house wall, also make no sense. In addition, the bodies partly run into each other, so two people have a common arm.

Trump’s hands also look misshapen, it looks like he’s missing a finger. The fact that he looks quite realistic overall is because the AI ​​was probably able to scan many pictures of Trump, since there are many shots of him as a public figure.

Therefore, AI fake pictures of celebrities usually appear quite real at first glance – the AI ​​simply had a lot of input for this. In contrast, AI tends to be less accurate on non-public figures, Higgins told the US website Wired.

However, AI images could stand out because emotions are shown too clearly on the face. This happens with both celebrities and non-public figures.

In addition to looking closely at the images, there are other ways to recognize AI-generated images. One Possibility is the Google image reverse search. This can be used to find out where the image can be found on the internet.

It also helps to check the news: Is there any information about the situation shown in the picture? Anyone who saves the image can also look at the metadata. Among other things, this shows the author as well as the time and date of origin.

Higgins himself probably wanted to point out Bellingcat’s commitment with the campaign – under a thread with pictures he refers to donation possibilities for the organization. However, the pictures are not always just a joke – even if that Donald Trump in orange prison suit at fast food store already becomes clear.

The images are also being used to spread fake news, as in the case of Trump’s alleged arrest, which never happened. In fact, Trump is currently against a porn star for misrepresenting hush money payments charged.

In general, experts expect that fake news, which is spread using AI-generated images, will be published more frequently in the coming years become. It is all the more important to be able to recognize fake images.

The Bellingcat founder was, according to his own statement Twitter By the way, blocked by Midjourney – he had used the image AI for the Trump fakes.