With voters heading to the polls in just a matter of weeks, a Centre for Policy Studies report warns that with deepfake content already spreading rapidly, this could become the UK’s first deepfake election.

You may have come across some suspicious videos on social media platforms recently. Perhaps you have seen a satirical TikTok video showing Rishi Sunak saying that he could not care less “about energy bills being over £3,000”? Or maybe a video of the shadow health secretary Wes Streeting calling his Labour colleague Diane Abbott a “silly woman” on Politics Live?

A report from the Centre for Policy Studies (CPS) called Facing Fakes warns that given the current general election campaign, we should be particularly wary of deepfakes aimed at spreading election misinformation and disinformation.

At E+T, we covered this topic in our March-April 2024 issue. The challenge is that the technology is there to very easily and cheaply create and spread realistic fake footage.

The CPS report warns...