New English Edition
Artificial Intelligence in Horticulture
Kim Kyung-jin, Attorney at Law
Across five chapters and ten sections, this book examines computer vision for crop diagnosis, harvesting robots and autonomous field systems, smart greenhouses and digital twins, precision irrigation and supply-chain quality control, high-throughput phenotyping, and predictive breeding.
New English Edition
Artificial Intelligence in Food Crop Agriculture
Kim Kyung-jin, Attorney at Law
Across six chapters and eighteen sections, the book examines digital agricultural infrastructure, remote sensing, crop diagnosis, yield forecasting, precision irrigation, genomics, molecular breeding, agricultural robotics, climate-smart agriculture, and global food security.
New English Edition
The Future of Forestry and Agroforestry
Kim Kyung-jin, Attorney at Law
Driven by Artificial Intelligence and Digital Innovation
Across five chapters and fifteen sections, the book follows satellites, drones, LiDAR, digital twins, forest-specific language models, wildfire and pest forecasting, forestry robotics, agroforestry, timber traceability, and forest carbon markets.
New English Edition
Smart Livestock Farming: AI Enters the Barn
Kim Kyung-jin, Attorney at Law
Sensors listen, cameras watch, and artificial intelligence helps farmers decide.
Across five chapters and fifteen sections, the book follows precision livestock farming from animal health and reproduction to robotic milking, virtual fencing, digital twins, methane reduction, welfare, and data ownership.
Table of Contents
Han Dong-hoon, Busan Buk-gu Gap: A Record of the 100 Days Before and After the Election (Mar. 26-Jul. 3, 2026)
Kim Kyung-jin
Table of Contents and 13 sections
From March 26 to July 3, 2026, this record follows the spring after expulsion, the Busan Buk-gu Gap by-election, victory as an independent, and the first bill submitted in the National Assembly.
Table of Contents
Artificial Intelligence and Medicine
Kim Kyung-jin, Attorney at Law
AI in clinical care, hospitals, education, and research
AI in medical imaging, risk prediction, treatment planning, hospital operations, education, and research, with patient safety, privacy, and accountability.
[AI Library] Chapter 4. Deepfakes and the End of Truth
Ten Questions AI Poses to Humanity
Chapter 4. Deepfakes and the End of Truth
Kim Kyung-jin
"A lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is still putting on its shoes." - Mark Twain
1. What Is a Deepfake?
The reactions of people who first saw the Tom Cruise video made by Belgian artist Chris Ume were telling. Over 11 million people watched and enjoyed it, and many believed Tom Cruise had actually filmed it himself. But it was a perfect fake. It was a finished product of 'deepfake,' a word born from the marriage of 'deep learning' and 'fake.'
Chris Ume said of his work, "I wanted to entertain people, raise awareness, and show them how it's done." But contrary to his intentions, the sheer perfection of the video instilled fear in many viewers. What if it had been a politician instead of Tom Cruise? What if the purpose had been malicious instead of fun?
The evolution of deepfake technology has been staggeringly fast. Just a few years ago, Hollywood production crews had to spend hundreds of millions of won and months of labor to create special effects. Now a smartphone app can produce them in minutes. All you need is a handful of photos and a few seconds of audio.
At first, everyone thought it was amusing. Content that swapped your face with a famous actor's or made historical figures speak modern words set social media on fire. But things changed over time. A fun toy began turning into a frightening weapon. Deepfakes have now grown so sophisticated that even experts struggle to tell real from fake.
In the world we grew up in, seeing was believing. Deepfakes are shaking that old conviction to its roots. We have entered an era where you can no longer be certain of what you see with your eyes or hear with your ears. In a world where videos, audio, and even photographs must be questioned, what are we supposed to trust?
2. Fake Videos Can Change a President
In May 2023, as Turkey's presidential election entered its final stretch, a shocking video surfaced. It showed opposition candidate Kemal Kilicdaroglu standing alongside a leader of the PKK, the Kurdish militant group. Released by President Erdogan's camp, the video swept across the country in an instant, making the opposition candidate look like a dangerous figure who would betray the nation.
But the video was a deepfake. A carefully calculated forgery. It exploited the nationalist sentiments of the Turkish people, planting the fear that "voting for this man will put the country in danger." The fabricated video spread like lightning across social media, and election day arrived before anyone had time to verify the truth. Erdogan won reelection. Analysts believe this single fake video played a decisive role in changing the outcome of the election.
An even more cunning case unfolded in Slovakia. On September 28, 2023, just two days before the general election, a fake audio recording of opposition leader Michal Simecka appeared at a perfectly calculated moment. In the manipulated recording, he could be heard saying, "We need to buy Roma votes with money to win the election."
The most vicious part was the timing. Under Slovakia's election law, all campaign-related activity is banned during a 'silence period' that begins 48 hours before voting. The opposition leader had no chance to refute or explain the false information. For 48 hours leading up to election day, voters were exposed to the lie that he was a corrupt politician, with no way to check the facts. The pro-Russian ruling party won. A single fake audio file changed the political fate of an entire country.
The 2024 U.S. presidential election deserved to be called 'the year of the deepfake election.' Countless fake videos and audio clips involving Trump and Harris flooded social media. A fabricated video about Democratic vice presidential candidate Tim Walz, created by a Russian individual, racked up 5 million views on X in a single day. Experts warned that deepfakes had become a new weapon for manipulating elections. The problem was that a concentrated barrage of fake videos right before an election could deal a fatal blow, leaving the opposing candidate no time to respond.
South Korea is no exception. Starting in 2024, a law banning the use of deepfakes in election campaigns from 90 days before the election through election day took effect. But technology is advancing too fast for laws and regulations alone to stop everything. The political abuse of deepfakes goes beyond the question of which candidate wins or loses. It threatens democracy itself by making it impossible for citizens to know what is true. Once the distrust that anything could be fake takes hold, people stop believing even genuine facts. An era of 'the end of truth' could arrive.
3. War Without Bullets: Deepfakes
On March 16, 2022, the Ukrainian news channel 'Ukraine 24' was hacked. Shortly afterward, a shocking video aired. President Zelensky appeared on screen, telling Ukrainians to "surrender to Russia." The words "Ukrainian soldiers, lay down your weapons and return to your families. Dying in this war is not worth it" flowed from his mouth.
Fortunately, the quality of the video was crude. Zelensky's head was too large for his body, and his voice was lower than usual, which made many people suspicious. President Zelensky immediately posted a rebuttal video. "I only recommend that Russian soldiers lay down their weapons and go home. We will not lay down any weapons until we achieve victory," he declared firmly.
But the possibilities this incident revealed were chilling. What if the fake video had been more sophisticated? It could have dealt a devastating blow to Ukrainian military morale. Russia continued launching deepfake attacks afterward, spreading a false report of Zelensky's suicide, fabricated news about infighting within the Azov Battalion, and various other pieces of disinformation.
On the other side, fake videos of President Putin declaring peace were also produced and circulated multiple times. These videos were designed to sow confusion among Russian citizens and raise doubts about the war. Experts call the Ukraine conflict 'the beginning of deepfake warfare.' They predict that in future wars, deepfakes will play a role as significant as actual weapons.
Similar events occurred in the military clashes between Israel and Iran. According to the BBC Verify team, the top three fake videos alone accumulated over 100 million views across multiple platforms. One video claimed an Israeli F-35 stealth fighter had been shot down, but a closer look revealed that the people nearby were roughly the same size as the vehicles, and the sand showed no trace of a fighter jet crash; it was clearly AI-generated. Still, the video was viewed 21.1 million times and accepted as though it were real combat footage.
Pro-Israel accounts spread fake information as well. They created a fabricated video showing citizens in Tehran, Iran's capital, protesting with signs reading "We love Israel," making it appear as though anti-government demonstrations were taking place inside Iran.
Russia invests an estimated $1.5 billion per year, roughly 2.1 trillion Korean won, in foreign influence operations, and a substantial portion of that spending goes toward information manipulation using deepfakes. War is no longer fought with guns and bombs alone. Deepfakes have become a new weapon for crushing enemy morale, manipulating international public opinion, and provoking internal divisions. A war without bullets has begun.
4. When Your Family Calls Asking for Money
"Mom, it's me. Something urgent came up and I need money." The phone call a Canadian mother received was unmistakably her son's voice. He sounded desperate, saying he had been in an accident and urgently needed 21,000 Canadian dollars. She sent the money without hesitation. Only later, when she spoke with her real son, did she discover that every word had been a lie. She had been deceived by her son's voice, synthesized with deepfake technology.
An even more shocking case took place in Hong Kong. In February 2024, an employee at a multinational corporation was tricked by a fake video conference created with deepfake technology, resulting in losses of approximately 34 billion Korean won. The perpetrators recreated company executives with flawless deepfakes, made it look like a real meeting, and ordered massive fund transfers. The victim was certain that every person he saw and spoke with on screen was a colleague he knew. The voices, the faces, the mannerisms were all perfect.
The most agonizing abuse of deepfakes is happening in the realm of sex crimes. According to data from the Korea Communications Standards Commission, corrective action requests for sexually explicit deepfake material surged from 473 cases in 2020 to 5,996 cases in 2023, a more than twelvefold increase. In the past, most illegal synthetic material targeted celebrities or public figures. Recently, however, deepfake sex crimes against ordinary people, especially classmates and coworkers, have risen sharply.
What is even more alarming is that ordinary minors are increasingly becoming perpetrators. Cases have emerged of elementary school students superimposing their teacher's face onto sexually explicit images and sharing them with classmates. The children treat it as a harmless game, but for the victims, it leaves irreversible damage.
One victim testified: "I couldn't go outside. I think I just stayed shut in at home. I hated the very idea of talking to another person." Many victims suffer from social anxiety, quit their jobs or stop attending school, and find it impossible to lead a normal life.
Deepfakes are also being widely exploited in investment fraud. Scammers have been stealing the faces and voices of trusted figures like Elon Musk and Son Suk-hee, former president of JTBC, to promote fake investment products. In Singapore, a deepfake video was produced showing Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong endorsing a cryptocurrency investment platform run by Elon Musk, causing many citizens to fall victim to the scheme.
Investment scams have also emerged using the name of American pop star Taylor Swift. A deepfake video of Taylor Swift recommending a specific investment product spread across social media, and fans lost large sums of money. What makes these scams so effective is that victims believe someone they already trust is personally making the recommendation. Even the most cautious person can be deceived when a celebrity they admire and trust appears on screen urging them to invest.
As technology has advanced to learn from social media posts containing voice recordings and replicate a person's voice with near-perfect accuracy, just a few seconds of audio is now enough to generate a convincing fake voice. We have entered an era where a video or voice message we casually posted online can be weaponized for crime at any moment.
5. The Collapse of Trust: A Society Where Nothing Can Be Believed
Yuval Noah Harari, author of the bestseller Sapiens, has expressed deep concern about the age of deepfakes. He said, 'Whether it's a photo, video, or audio you see on screen, you can no longer trust any of it,' describing this as 'the end of the era of truth.' He pointed out that some institution or authority needs to verify what is real, but society is not prepared for this.
The most serious problem with deepfakes is that they make it impossible for people to know what is true. In the past, seeing was believing. Now, even what you see with your own eyes and hear with your own ears cannot be trusted. This situation is called the 'Liar's Dividend.' It means that as deepfake technology improves, liars gain an ever-greater advantage. Even when genuine evidence surfaces, it can be dismissed with the claim, 'That could be a deepfake too.'
Mo Gawdat, former Chief Business Officer of Google X, warned that AI can manipulate content through social media and create echo chambers that push people toward extreme views. An echo chamber is a phenomenon where people communicate only with others who share similar opinions, hearing the same ideas repeated back to them. AI algorithms analyze a user's past interests and click patterns, then keep recommending similar content. With deepfakes added to the mix, people end up seeing only what they want to see, and they can't even tell that what they're watching is fake.
Someone who dislikes a particular politician gets a steady stream of deepfake videos showing that politician doing terrible things, and they come to believe those videos are real. Someone who supports the same politician sees only flattering content. This phenomenon tears society apart. People exposed to completely different versions of the same event reach completely different conclusions, and communication and compromise become impossible. Rational debate and compromise, the foundations of democracy, begin to disappear.
The spread of deepfakes is also eroding trust in the press. As people start doubting the news, the role of legitimate journalism weakens. Deepfake technology is being used to mass-produce fake news while simultaneously spreading the message that 'all news could be fake,' undermining the credibility of real journalism as well. Fact-checking and verification have become more important than ever, but deepfake technology is evolving so fast that even news organizations struggle to keep up.
Serious problems are emerging in the courtroom as well. When video or audio evidence is submitted, it has become difficult to determine whether it was fabricated with deepfakes. This is a grave issue that could shake the foundations of the judicial system. Striking the right balance between free expression and regulation is another challenge. Strict regulation of deepfakes could end up restricting legitimate artistic work or parody, while loose regulation could allow the damage to keep growing.
Geoffrey Hinton, the pioneer of deep learning often called 'the Godfather of AI,' has consistently warned about the dangers of AI technology. He has stressed the importance of international cooperation to prevent the misuse of AI technologies, including deepfakes. Because deepfakes spread around the world in an instant through the internet, no single country can solve the problem alone. But because each country has different laws and cultures, creating a unified response is far from easy.
Technical countermeasures are being developed, but they have fundamental limitations. An endless cat-and-mouse game is playing out between the technology that creates deepfakes and the technology that detects them. As soon as a new deepfake detection method appears, an even more sophisticated generation technique is developed to evade it. According to the scientific journal Nature, detection success rates are high for previously known deepfake generators, but detection rates for new generators remain relatively low.
Kim Kyung-jin
Attorney · Former Member of the National Assembly · AI Policy Researcher
© 2026 Kim Kyung-jin. All rights reserved.