PSA: A fake video of a local mayor almost got me at a town hall meeting last month

I was at the Springville town hall meeting, just watching on my phone, when they showed a clip of the mayor saying something crazy about raising taxes. Everyone started booing, but something felt off. I paused it, looked close, and the way his mouth moved on the word 'triple' was just wrong, like a bad puppet. I checked the official feed and that clip was never part of his speech. It was a deep fake someone made to stir trouble. Now I check the source of any political clip before I even think about sharing it. Has anyone else caught a fake in what seemed like a normal local news stream?

4 comments

4 Comments

emma_garcia2mo ago

Honestly, what gets me is how this stuff targets small towns now. We expect it in national races, but a local mayor? The tech is cheap enough that any angry person with a grudge can try to swing a zoning vote or a school board election. It makes you wonder how many boring local meetings have been disrupted by fakes that no one caught. Do you think the town should have a way to flag these clips right on the official stream?

amyh122mo ago

Zoning votes? That's a whole new level of scary. Someone could fake a clip of a council member saying they'll bulldoze a park to put in a parking lot. People would show up FURIOUS to the next meeting over something that never even happened. The official stream needs a big red warning button or something, for real.

paige1662d ago

Honestly the official stream should have like a verified badge or something next to it lol. A big red warning sounds good too but people will just ignore it. Maybe the town clerk could post an official clarification within an hour of any meeting. That way if someone drops a fake clip everyone can check the real source to see what actually happened. Just a simple time stamped summary of votes and decisions would help so much.

matthewmiller2mo ago

Scary stuff, @amyh12. I once got fooled by a fake clip of my own cousin... and I was at the birthday party where they claim he said it.