The shock of Sora's one-click generation of AI people has not yet faded, but dummies have quietly appeared in large numbers on the Internet.

上个月，中国香港警方通报了一起香港史上最大的诈骗案，The amount involved is as high as HK$200 million 。受害人是一名跨国公司员工，他受邀参加一场线上会议，领导、同事、财务科科长都在。会议上，在“领导”的指挥下，他把2亿港元先后分15次转入了指定账户。

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It was not until a week later that the victim realized that something was wrong. He was the only "real person" in the entire online meeting, and everyone else was "dummy" who used AI to change their faces.

It has been a year since the wave of artificial intelligence models has swept the world. Many industries have been profoundly changed, and AI digital humans have taken the lead in penetrating into our lives.

Low price, convenient, one-click generation

It may sound outrageous, but AI face-changing and AI digital humans are indeed the closest AI technologies to us, even closer than ChatGPT.

Without the need for professional equipment or complex operations, video production software such as clipping and screening has long lowered the threshold of digital humans to almost zero. It is free, simple and fast.

After downloading the clip from the app store, click "Start Creating" and randomly select a video or a photo from the album. After that, select "New Text", and the AI digital person can be seen in the text editing options.

Jianying

At present, Jianying provides 35 types of digital people, from aunties next door to Latin beauties, from cheerful school girls to white men in suits, with various races, ages, voices, and postures to choose from.

The mouth shape of the digital person will be adjusted according to the copy, the speech will be in cadence, and the head and hands will naturally move with the explanation. If it weren't for the "AI-generated" watermark in the upper left corner, it would be really difficult to distinguish between a professional anchor and a digital person.

I made one myself| Jianying

Might as well be bold:AI was used to automatically generate the copy, then it was translated into English using AI, and finally it was spoken by a foreign AI digital person. In five minutes, a 1080p advertising blockbuster with acceptable quality was made. There is no need for a team to make videos. Copywriting, translation, anchor, and editing can all be the AI itself.

It looks quite like it| Jianying

On commercial tracks, the performance of digital people is even more unique.

Jingdong launched the "Yan Xi" digital person anchor as early as 2022. After reading the product introduction, this digital person can automatically generate a selling point copy and complete the oral broadcast. It focuses on "free time live streaming", helping stores fill in the gaps in live broadcasts late at night, early morning and other hours.

根据京东官方数据，2023年双11期间，more than 4000品牌的直播间用上了数字主播，The conversion rate of leisure live broadcasts increased by 30%。

Baidu has also launched the "Smart Broadcast Star" digital person solution and launched a full-stack slogan, claiming that it only takes three steps and can create its own digital person anchor in as fast as three minutes. In addition, there are also products to choose from Tencent Zhiying, Baidu Intelligent Yunxiling Platform, Huawei YunPangu Digital Person and other products.

Just like you think, here comes the liar

Everything from copywriting to videos is generated by AI, and some people actually do this.

Reducing costs is a prerequisite for the scale of digital man scams-when the scammer himself can make a video of acceptable quality in five minutes, the credibility of those videos that were once attributed to real-life appearances has disappeared.

If you often browse Short Video, you will see chicken soup marketing numbers from time to time,"Eight Truths of Life","Seven Things Women Need to Know After They're Over 30","How to Do It Can Open the gap with Your peers in Five Years" are hot topics among them.

Recently, some foreigners with thick eyebrows and big eyes have also joined this track. For example, this one below:

A foreign beauty stood in front of the camera and spoke English, eloquently recounting the "Seven Principles to Remember in the Depression." What are "Don't judge others at will" and "Only say three things when you meet people, but don't throw your heart away"...

On closer inspection, you will see that the English she speaks is also translated into English. For example,"a person must have a city government" is translated into "must have a city government".

For users who don't understand English and don't often watch science and technology news, such videos are quite confusing. It is difficult for them to distinguish which content is real people and which content is AI.

On the WeChat video account, there is a video titled "GPT talks about how to support the elderly without having children" that is widely circulated, with tens of thousands of likes and retweets. The uncles and aunts in the comment area are amazed at their insights into AI.

But in fact, the original author of the video just entered a copy that had been circulating on the Internet for a long time into GPT and asked GPT to read it aloud.

It seems more convincing to say the same thing from the mouth of the AI, and traffic is just getting here.| WeChat video number

The same goes for "foreigner digital people". The same copy, if spoken in English by foreigners, seems to naturally carry a certain "foreign monk" correctness, which is more conducive to dissemination. There are also some accounts that do the opposite, allowing digital foreigners to speak lame "Western-style Chinese."

In October last year, such "fake foreigner digital person accounts" began to become popular on Short Video platforms. Some accounts only posted 30 to 40 videos and gained hundreds of thousands of fans, and many works received more than 10,000 likes.

As for their means of monetization, the most direct is to sell goods. For example, an account on a certain parenting topic introduced various parenting books in a foreigner's tone after the number of fans increased. Many parents believed it, and some praised the digital person for "clear speech, generous and powerful."

A "team of experts" of all skin colors| WeChat video number

After buying the goods back, I realized that it was not the case at all.

WeChat video number

Who stole my face?

Looking at these lively dummies, I couldn't help but wonder, where did the face of AI digital people come from?

In the sixth episode of "Joan is Awful" of "Black Mirror", the big star signed an agreement with the streaming media. Later TV series did not have to participate in it personally. As long as AI was used to change their faces to a double or model, the money would keep rolling. Come on. As for what streaming media used their own faces to act, the stars had no idea.

This face could also be you| Joan is Awful

"Black Mirror" is still lacking in imagination. The future in the film has long arrived, and the face of the employee does not even give money.

In early March, some media reported on the bizarre encounter of Ukraine video blogger Olga Loiek:She was originally just a small blogger with 10,000 followers on YouTube. She accidentally discovered that many online platforms in China actually appeared on AI digital person Short Video using her own face as a template.

This figure identified herself as Natasha, 31 years old, and lived in Russia. Most of the account content praises China as Russian women, and takes the opportunity to bring Russian products. The number of fans reaches more than 200,000.

In 2022, an account called "Nana of Russia" appeared on some Short Video platforms. The filter was filled and she changed her face into a Russian. The route was exactly the same as "Natasha." The number of fans once exceeded more than 1.8 million, and was subsequently banned by the platform. But before that, she had made hundreds of thousands of yuan by bringing goods.

It looks a bit like the Valley of Horrors| Nana, Russia

What's more troublesome is that such fraud is almost zero risk. Victims are often far away abroad and cannot be directly held accountable. The goods they bring are not counterfeit and shoddy products, and consumers cannot complain. Only after it is exposed will the platform supervise itself. But at that time, scammers often had already made a lot of money and ran away to open the next account.

In the past, although there were related special effects software that could achieve facial imitation, the technical difficulty required was beyond ordinary people's ability. The AI model reduces the difficulty of this operation to almost zero. According to media reports, the operation team of the counterfeit Loiek uses an AI software called HeyGen. The monthly fee is only tens of dollars. The material required is just a few videos of the person involved.

Less than two years after the birth of digital humans, they have disrupted Short Video and live tracks. Technology has advanced and price cuts are so fast that even the future predicted in "Black Mirror" seems outdated. Who knows what kind of world AI will bring us into? I'm not sure it's a better world.

author:Grain, turn over

edit:flip through

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