Marketing using influencers (including celebrities and social media personalities) isn’t anything new, but it has seen rapid growth in recent years, commanding more attention from consumers and a larger chunk of marketing budgets. With influencer marketing, brands can target their products to specific audience segments in a way that is engaging, authentic and relatable.
New technology has the potential to disrupt the way in which brands use influencers and celebrities in advertising campaigns. With artificial intelligence (AI), brands can digitally manipulate videos, images and audio clips to create a convincing but fake piece of media, ie, a “deepfake”. Deepfakes are quickly becoming more sophisticated, opening up more innovative and creative possibilities for brands to engage their target audiences. This article explores some of the opportunities and challenges with using deepfakes in advertising and provides our thoughts on some of the legal considerations involved in using deepfakes in brand campaigns.
What is a deepfake?
Deepfakes are pieces of media which have been digitally manipulated to replace one person’s likeness convincingly with that of another. Deepfakes are created using a form of AI known as “deep learning”. By way of example, the deepfake TikTok account @deeptomcruise shows someone who appears to be actor Tom Cruise dancing, playing golf and doing a magic trick. The likeness to the actor is uncanny but in reality, actor and impersonator Miles Fisher is behind the camera – his image has been digitally manipulated using deepfake technology.
Much attention on deepfakes focuses on their potential for use in nefarious purposes, particularly as the first known examples of deepfake videos posted online in 2017 featured celebrities’ faces swapped with those of porn stars, and deepfakes have been used more recently in fake news. As deepfakes become more convincing, and the public become more aware of the technology, legitimate use cases are being explored.
Use of deepfake technology by brands
Deepfakes can present a number of opportunities for brands wishing to extend their reach in innovative and exciting ways and cut marketing costs:
Legal considerations
With these new and exciting use cases, brands should consider the following when looking to use deepfakes in advertising:
All of these legal risks should be addressed in the production and publication of the ad copy and the contract with the influencer. If you would like to know more about how you can deal with the risks of using deepfakes in your advertising, or contracting with influencers and celebrities more generally, please do reach out.
