McAfee & Intel launch advanced AI deepfake detection tech in Australia

McAfee and Intel have come together to launch an advanced, AI-driven deepfake detection technology. The partnership was announced at the recent RSA conference held in San Francisco. The modernisation is a response to a burgeoning interest in deepfakes in Australia, a trend McAfee and Intel are tackling head-on through the innovative use of the NPU in Intel Core Ultra processor-based PCs.

Dubbed the McAfee Deepfake Detector, the cutting-edge technology utilises AI detection methods, including transformer-based Deep Neural Network models. These have been skilfully trained to recognise and alert users when artificial intelligence might have generated or manipulated the audio in a video. This joint venture between McAfee and Intel represents a significant step forward in meeting pertinent consumer and societal needs, protecting Australian consumers against the increasing prevalance of scams.

The relevance of this innovation cannot be overstated in a context where concern over the impact of deepfakes is at an all-time high. Data shows that 68% of Australians are more anxious about deepfakes than they were just a year ago, with a mere 25% confident in their ability to distinguish real from artificially created content if the latter were embedded in a voicemail or voice note.

The Deepfake Detector, an evolved manifestation of the Project Mockingbird, is McAfee's resonse to the mounting public concern over misinformation and scam deepfake content. The new technology is equipped to tackle such issues, strengthened by the collaborations with Intel which reinforce McAfee's commitment to supply innovative, efficient online protection solutions.

Cybercriminals nowadays frequently employ AI to subtly alter the audio in a video, creating convincingly deceptive deepfake scams. However, McAfee's Deepfake Detector uses complex AI detection methods to effectively notice when audio content is likely to have been tampered with. The technology's performance and privacy benefits were showcased at the RSA conference, demonstrating the potential improvements to customer experience when Intel's PC AI technology is utilised.

The technology leverages the NPU in Intel Core Ultra processor-based PCs for local inference, or the detection of deepfakes, without compromising user privacy by sending personal information to the cloud. Indeed, McAfee has measured up to a 300% performance improvement on the same deepfake detection model by harnessing the power of the NPU. Such enhanced performance, combined with the privacy benefits and improved battery life associated with local model execution, offers significant advantages to the customer.

Head of APAC at McAfee, Tyler McGee, expressed his enthusiasm for the collaboration claiming that, "In a world where seeing is no longer believing, where AI-generated deepfakes have made it harder than ever to tell real from fake, consumers need the latest in AI to beat AI". He continued, "With Intel, we're now going even one step further in delivering a seamless and robust customer experience. Leveraging Intel's Core Ultra processor technology and its NPU, we can provide consumers with the most advanced and powerful generative AI deepfake detection capabilities, without compromising on performance or privacy."

Carla Rodríguez, Vice President and General Manager of Ecosystem Partner Enabling at Intel also expressed excitement in partnering with industry leaders like McAfee, enabling their shared commitment to utilise AI for the greater good.

The McAfee Deepfake Detector will soon be available for English language detection, followed by rollouts of other language detections in subsequent phases. In the battle against online misinformation and scams, McAfee's strides in AI-powered deepfake detection technology present a promising and powerful tool in the arsenal for consumer protection.