Synthetic media

The advent of deepfake technology, initially perceived as a novel form of entertainment and creative expression, has rapidly evolved into a potent tool for political manipulation and erosion of public trust. This paper explores the weaponization of deepfakes, examining how synthetic media is increasingly deployed to distort reality, spread disinformation, and undermine democratic processes. By analyzing notable case studies and the psychological impact on audiences, the study highlights the challenges deepfakes pose to verifying truth in the digital age. Furthermore, it discusses the implications for media literacy, legal frameworks, and technological countermeasures aimed at safeguarding public trust. Ultimately, this research underscores the urgent need for a multidisciplinary response to address the ethical, social, and political consequences of deepfake proliferation beyond their entertainment origins.

The subject of the paper is qualifying the creation and sharing of child pornography in the form of deep fakes under Polish criminal law, including proposals for amending selected articles of the Penal Code. Due to the quality of synthesis, audio or visual content generated or modified by artificial intelligence is now almost indistinguishable from real content. The dissemination of technology has led to a significant increase in the number of synthetic media circulating in the information space, which also includes pornographic materials depicting minors in the form of deep fakes. This issue has not yet been the subject of an extensive analysis in the Polish doctrine. The topic rarely appears in the global discourse on the harmfulness of deep fakes. The aim of this study is to propose legislative changes that will enable the regulations to be adapted to the rapid development of modern technologies, and thus to more adequately qualify the creation and sharing of child pornography in the form of deep fakes. The authors propose an assessment of social harm based on the epistemic value of synthetic media and the practical consequences of the multiplication of deep fakes.

The global crisis of language endangerment meets a technological turning point as Generative AI (GenAI) and Large Language Models (LLMs) unlock new frontiers in automating corpus creation, transcription, translation, and tutoring. However, this promise is imperiled by fragmented practices and the critical lack of a methodology to navigate the fraught balance between LLM capabilities and the profound risks of data scarcity, cultural misappropriation, and ethical missteps. This paper introduces a novel analytical framework that systematically evaluates GenAI applications against language-specific needs, embedding community governance and ethical safeguards as foundational pillars. We demonstrate its efficacy through the Te Reo Māori revitalization, where it illuminates successes, such as community-led Automatic Speech Recognition achieving 92% accuracy, while critically surfacing persistent challenges in data sovereignty and model bias for digital archives and educational tools. Our findings underscore that GenAI can indeed revolutionize language preservation, but only when interventions are rigorously anchored in community-centric data stewardship, continuous evaluation, and transparent risk management. Ultimately, this framework provides an indispensable toolkit for researchers, language communities, and policymakers, aiming to catalyze the ethical and high-impact deployment of LLMs to safeguard the world's linguistic heritage.

The EU Artificial Intelligence Act is the world's first attempt to holistically regulate artificial intelligence. It presents an extensive, multi-faceted definition of deepfakes, and introduces specific safeguards against their misuses. These guardrails have the potential to become a global role model. The AI Act uses concepts that leave room for interpretation, which is important given the constant development of technology and the need for adjustments. However, some solutions raise the problem of vagueness, which in turn may result in a narrower interpretation of a linguistic nature, and reduce the scope of legally permissible countermeasures. The aim of this study is to critically evaluate the definition of deepfakes contained in the AI Act in relation to the word “existing” used. A narrow interpretation could potentially exclude some synthetic media from the scope of transparency obligations due to the non-classification of these media as deepfakes. Therefore, a teleological interpretation of the provisions is proposed, reinforced with elements of systemicity, so that the safeguards built by the AI Act also include deepfakes that do not depict any identifiable pre-existing persons, objects, places, entities or events to better reflect goals of the regulation, and complement the value-based system of the AI Act.

The present research describes the production and characterization of L-Asparaginase from Aspergillus fumigatus isolated from the medicinal plant Annona muricata. This fungal isolate have shown potential to produce L-Asparaginase on modified Czapek Dox medium under optimal conditions. Characterization of enzyme was revealed the finest conditions for highest production.it was observed that the maximum production of L-Asparaginase at a pH of 8, 40 0 C of temperature, 20 minutes of incubation period, Presence of Fe 2+ ions and. 20mM substrate concentration.

Yapay Zeka (YZ) günümüzde “deepfake” olarak bilinen ve gerçek videolara çok benzeyen sentetik videoların kitlesel olarak oluşturulmasını mümkün hale getirmektedir. Görsel iletişimin gücü ve belirsizliğin kamusal söyleme duyulan güveni sarsmada oynadığı rol ile ilgili teorileri birleştirerek, deepfake’lerin çevrimiçi dezenformasyona olası katkılarını açıklıyoruz. Birleşik Krallık nüfusunu temsil eden geniş bir örnekleme yeni deneysel uygulamalar yaparak, insanların deepfake’lere ilişkin değerlendirmelerini karşılaştırdık. Katılımcıların deepfake’ler tarafından yanlış yönlendirilmekten çok, belirsizlik hissetme olasılıklarının daha yüksek olduğunu ve ortaya çıkan bu belirsizliğin sosyal medyada yer alan haberlere duyulan güveni azalttığını bulduk. Deepfake’lerin genelleştirilmiş kararsızlık ve sinizme katkıda bulunabileceği ve demokratik toplumlarda çevrimiçi yurttaşlık kültürüne yönelik mevcut zorlukları daha fazla arttırabileceği sonuçlarına ulaştık.

Synthetic or artificial media are digital media created by artificial intelligence. More precisely, they are created by manipulation of artificial intelligence algorithms. Synthetic text, image, sound, video, and various 3D applications are the main types of synthetic media. These highquality forms of virtual content have drawn the attention of the general public, mostly due to their ability to manipulate perceptions. ChatGPT, OpenAI’s text generation programme, broke all records in terms of fast adoption in the general public, capital investments and technological breakthroughs that are potentially more far-reaching even than the internet itself. The creation of a synthetic text involves the use of artificial intelligence, including natural language processing (NLP), to generate written content such as articles, news, stories and social media posts. OpenAI developed a language model whose output text is similar to human created text, and which is capable of answering questions. Notwithstanding all interesting innovations introduced by this advanced technology, especially in the world of entertainment, we must also question the possible ethical and social implications, but also the implications for the use of “small” languages like Croatian. ChatGPT is rather good at translating inquiries and replies into English, which functions as a lingua franca, but it often has trouble translating English into other languages. Languages such as French and Chinese, which are known as “high-resource” languages and are extensively represented in databases, translate from and into English much better than Javanese and other “low-resource” languages. Difficulties in translation into the Croatian language on the one hand and inaccurate factographic information on the Croatian language culture on the other arise in this context.

Discernir entre a realidade e a construção de conteúdos é uma habilidade fundamental em todas
as formas de mídia. No contexto contemporâneo, a comunicação descentralizada e a proliferação das
mídias sociais tornaram a situação ainda mais complexa. A democratização da criação e compartilhamento de informações, embora benéfica, dificulta a monitoração e identificação de textos, áudios
e imagens manipulados ou retirados de contexto. A evolução de ferramentas de inteligência artificial
generativa, como deepfakes, tem facilitado a criação de conteúdos falsos altamente realistas. Essas
tecnologias permitem a criação de imagens, vídeos e áudios que são praticamente indistinguíveis dos
conteúdos autênticos, aumentando a capacidade de manipulação da opinião pública. A disseminação
intencional de desinformação, potencializada por essas tecnologias, ameaça a integridade das instituições democráticas e a confiança pública. Este ensaio argumenta que o letramento midiático é
essencial, mas deve ser complementado por tecnologias avançadas de detecção de mídias sintéticas e
por legislações robustas que responsabilizem os desenvolvedores dessas tecnologias.

Synthetic or artificial media are digital media created by artificial intelligence. More precisely, they are created by manipulation of artificial intelligence algorithms. Synthetic text, image, sound, video, and various 3D applications are the main types of synthetic media. These highquality forms of virtual content have drawn the attention of the general public, mostly due to their ability to manipulate perceptions. ChatGPT, OpenAI's text generation programme, broke all records in terms of fast adoption in the general public, capital investments and technological breakthroughs that are potentially more far-reaching even than the internet itself. The creation of a synthetic text involves the use of artificial intelligence, including natural language processing (NLP), to generate written content such as articles, news, stories and social media posts. OpenAI developed a language model whose output text is similar to humancreated text, and which is capable of answering questions. Notwithstanding all interesting innovations introduced by this advanced technology, especially in the world of entertainment, we must also question the possible ethical and social implications, but also the implications for the use of "small" languages like Croatian. ChatGPT is rather good at translating inquiries and replies into English, which functions as a lingua franca, but it often has trouble translating English into other languages. Languages such as French and Chinese, which are known as "high-resource" languages and are extensively represented in databases, translate from and into English much better than Javanese and other "low-resource" languages. Difficulties in translation into the Croatian language on the one hand and inaccurate factographic information on the Croatian language culture on the other arise in this context.

Due to the fast spread of data through digital media, individuals and societies must assess the reliability of information. Deepfakes are not a novel idea but they are now a widespread phenomenon. The impact of deepfakes and disinformation can range from infuriating individuals to affecting and misleading entire societies and even nations. There are several ways to detect and generate deepfakes online. By conducting a systematic literature analysis, in this study we explore automatic key detection and generation methods, frameworks, algorithms, and tools for identifying deepfakes (audio, images, and videos), and how these approaches can be employed within different situations to counter the spread of deepfakes and the generation of disinformation. Moreover, we explore state-of-the-art frameworks related to deepfakes to understand how emerging machine learning and deep learning approaches affect online disinformation. We also highlight practical challenges and trends in implementing policies to counter deepfakes. Finally, we provide policy recommendations based on analyzing how emerging artificial intelligence (AI) techniques can be employed to detect and generate deepfakes online. This study benefits the community and readers by providing a better understanding of recent developments in deepfake detection and generation frameworks. The study also sheds a light on the potential of AI in relation to deepfakes.

Objective: The present investigations (In vitro) on an influence of different synthetic and food based [flour] media, pH, temperature and microbial nutrients on growth, Deoxynivalenol [DON] and Nivalenol [NIV] production by Fusarium aethiopicum and F. culmorum was carried out. Methods: Fusarium species associated with the finger millets were isolated and identified phenotypically and further confirmed by molecular methods by Polymerase Chain Reaction [PCR]. Monosporic seven day old F. aethiopicum and F. culmorum were grown in CYA broth and incubated at 27±2°C on rotary shaker for 21 days at 120 rpm. At the end of 21 day incubation period, cultures were harvested for determination of fungal biomass. The resultant culture filtrates were extracted twice with ethyl acetate and concentrated to get and final concentration of 1 ml in methanol and employed for RP-HPLC analysis for detection of DON and NIV production. Results: Finger millets flour medium induced the highest amount of mycelial growth, DON and NIV production by F. aethiopicum. However, F. culmorum achieved highest amount of hyphal growth, DON and NIV production under the influence of yeast extract sucrose [YES] medium. Maize flour medium, rice flour medium and sorghum flour medium was next preffered substrates. Optimum pH of 5.5-6.5 and temperature of 20-35°C for growth, DON and NIV production was observed. Both the species of Fusarium failed to grow and produce toxins at pH 2.5-3.5 and temperature of 40°C. Yeast extract was most favorable for maximum DON and NIV production, which increased with an increase in its concentration. On the other hand, malt extract and beef extract induced good growth and mycotoxin production at comparatively higher concentration in both the species of Fusarium under study. Conclusion: Comparatively food based media were the better substrates than synthetic media for both growth and DOIN and NIV production by two species of Fusarium under investigation. A positive correlation coefficient [r] on growth [0.458], DON [0.744] and NIV [0.882] was recorded among the media and both the species of Fusarium.

Call for Abstracts: Screen Studies in the Age of Extended Reality & Synthetic Media

An international conference to take place at Trinity College Dublin on June 4th-5th 2024, as part of the Irish Research Council Laureate Award project “From Cinematic Realism to Extended Reality: Reformulating Screen
Studies at the Precipice of Hyper-reality” (2022-2026).

Keynote speaker:
Professor Jenna Ng (Head of Creative Technologies and Professor of Digital Media and Culture at the University of York).

Objective: To isolate and characterize of L-asparaginase producing fungi from medicinal plants. Methods: Fungal strains were isolated on standard media, characterized and were screened for their ability to produce L-asparginase, used in the treatment of certain types of cancers, using modified Czapek-Dox medium supplemented with L-asparagine. Results: A total of 10 fungal isolates were obtained from 3 plant leaf samples and two isolates exhibited significant L-aspargniase production. Fusarium sp. (SMGR-F1) isolated from the papaya leaves showed the maximum activity. The organism was grown under submerged fermentation conditions at 30 °C produced 111.07±1.53 IU/ml of L-asparaginase at 120 h. Conclusion: L-asparaginase is being effectively used for the treatment of acute lymphoblastic leukemia and tumor cells. Fusarium sp. was isolated from the papaya plant leaves showing significant L-asparaginase activity and thus can be further exploited for the commercial production of L-asparaginase.

An effort has been made to find the best medium and operating conditions for the production of extracellular L-asparaginase by Aspergillus terreus in shake culture fermentation through stepwise optimization strategies like studies on the effect of pH and temperature on L-asparaginase, studies on the enzyme activity in various concentration of L-glutamine and study the growth kinetics for L-glutamine medium. Our study shows that L-glutamine combined with L-asparagine influence the asparaginase production level and physical parameter such as pH and temperature has more contribution in enzyme production. The pH 8 and temperature 35°C found to be good environmental condition the production of extracellular L-asparaginase by Aspergillus terreus.

This is to certify that the dissertation entitled "Artificial Intelligence generated Synthetic Media and its applications in the Media Industry", submitted to Symbiosis Centre for Media and Communication, in fulfilment of the requirements for the award of the degree of Bachelor of Arts in Media and Communication, is a record of original and bonafide research work done by Mr Akshat Bhatnagar during the period 2019 to 2022, under my supervision and guidance and that the dissertation has not previously formed the basis for the award of any Degree/ Diploma/ or any similar title and that the dissertation represents independent work on the part of the candidate. I further certify that the work is worth submitting for the award of the said degree. This certificate only indicates that the student is a bonafide student of SCMC and has submitted the dissertation in partial fulfilment of the degree. The student was to write the dissertation independently following all academic and ethical norms explained by the faculty from time to time. The final writing was entirely the student's effort. Therefore, the responsibility of the content rests solely with the student.

Onekligen tänjer den tekniska utvecklingen våra vedertagna begrepp och uppfattningar om verkligheten. Men hur mycket? De nederländska strategianalytikerna Menno van Doorn, Sander Duivestein och Thijs Pepping undersöker i boken Real Fake: Playing with Reality in the Age of AI, Deepfakes and the Metaverse (Ludibrium, 2021) hur människan som berättare och spelare tenderar att skapa sin egen verklighet, förstärkt av gruppens behov och delade intressen. Vilken roll kommer journalistiken att spela i denna utveckling?

The present investigation deals with the anti-proliferative activity of an extracellular enzyme known as LAsparaginase from Aspergillus fumigatus screened from infected leaves of the medicinal plant Annona muricata. The anti-proliferative activity of L-Asparaginase from Aspergillus fumigatus was checked on human breast cancer cell line MDA-MB-231.The influence of pH, temperature, substrate concentration, incubation period and concentration of metal ions were analyzed in the production of L-Asparaginase. The highest production of enzyme noticed at a pH of 8, 20mM substrate concentration, 20 minutes of incubation period, Presence of Fe ions and 40 C of temperature. These were the optimum conditions for the effective yield of enzyme. The enzyme isolated from Aspergillus fumigatus is a promising antiproliferative agent and can be used in the expansion of further compositions for the therapy of tumors.

Objective: To isolate and characterize of L-asparaginase producing fungi from medicinal plants. Methods: Fungal strains were isolated on standard media, characterized and were screened for their ability to produce L-asparginase, used in the treatment of certain types of cancers, using modified Czapek-Dox medium supplemented with L-asparagine. Results: A total of 10 fungal isolates were obtained from 3 plant leaf samples and two isolates exhibited significant L-aspargniase production. Fusarium sp. (SMGR-F1) isolated from the papaya leaves showed the maximum activity. The organism was grown under submerged fermentation conditions at 30 °C produced 111.07±1.53 IU/ml of L-asparaginase at 120 h. Conclusion: L-asparaginase is being effectively used for the treatment of acute lymphoblastic leukemia and tumor cells. Fusarium sp. was isolated from the papaya plant leaves showing significant L-asparaginase activity and thus can be further exploited for the commercial production of L-asparagin...

The present research describes the production and characterization of L-Asparaginase from Aspergillus fumigatus isolated from the medicinal plant Annona muricata. This fungal isolate have shown potential to produce L-Asparaginase on modified Czapek Dox medium under optimal conditions. Characterization of enzyme was revealed the finest conditions for highest production.it was observed that the maximum production of L-Asparaginase at a pH of 8, 40 C of temperature, 20 minutes of incubation period, Presence of Fe ions and. 20mM substrate concentration.

The present investigation deals with the anti-proliferative activity of an extracellular enzyme known as LAsparaginase from Aspergillus fumigatus screened from infected leaves of the medicinal plant Annona muricata. The anti-proliferative activity of L-Asparaginase from Aspergillus fumigatus was checked on human breast cancer cell line MDA-MB-231.The influence of pH, temperature, substrate concentration, incubation period and concentration of metal ions were analyzed in the production of L-Asparaginase. The highest production of enzyme noticed at a pH of 8, 20mM substrate concentration, 20 minutes of incubation period, Presence of Fe ions and 40 C of temperature. These were the optimum conditions for the effective yield of enzyme. The enzyme isolated from Aspergillus fumigatus is a promising antiproliferative agent and can be used in the expansion of further compositions for the therapy of tumors.

Influence of medium, pH and temperature on L-asparaginase production by Thielavia terrestris, Malbranchea cinnamomea and Scytalidium thermophilum in submerged fermentation process was investigated. Maximum L-asparaginase production was recorded in the glucose medium supplemented with 0.5% L-asparagine monohydrate on 8th day of incubation. Czapek-dox medium was the next proffered medium for both biomass and L-asparaginase production by the fungi under investigation. Among different pH tried, pH 7.0 was optimum for L-asparaginase production, while enzyme production was marginal in medium with 6.0-8.0. Temperature of 45°C and 50°C were optimum for T. terrestris for growth of M. cinnamomea and S. thermophilum respectively. Maximum L-asparaginase activity of all three fungi was recorded at 45°C with varying extent was recorded. Analysis of variance of the data revealed significant differences (p-0.05) among the different culture media, pH and temperature on the production of L-asparagina...

Influence of medium, pH and temperature on L-asparaginase production by Thielavia terrestris, Malbranchea cinnamomea and Scytalidium thermophilum in submerged fermentation process was investigated. Maximum L-asparaginase production was recorded in the glucose medium supplemented with 0.5% L-asparagine monohydrate on 8th day of incubation. Czapek-dox medium was the next proffered medium for both biomass and L-asparaginase production by the fungi under investigation. Among different pH tried, pH 7.0 was optimum for L-asparaginase production, while enzyme production was marginal in medium with 6.0-8.0. Temperature of 45°C and 50°C were optimum for T. terrestris for growth of M. cinnamomea and S. thermophilum respectively. Maximum L-asparaginase activity of all three fungi was recorded at 45°C with varying extent was recorded. Analysis of variance of the data revealed significant differences (p-0.05) among the different culture media, pH and temperature on the production of L-asparaginase. A significant and positive correlation coefficient (R) was also observed between the growth and L-asparaginase activity of T. terrestris (0.570), M. cinnamomea (0.947) and S. thermophilum (0.948). Conclusion the culture medium and factors like pH, incubation temperature and incubation period play an important role in the L-asparaginase production by all the three thermophilic caprophilous fungi.