Dazhon Darien was detained on Thursday by Baltimore County police, who claim he used conceptual AI to fabricate a racist talk that sounded like the principal of Pikesville High School.
By Emilia David, a writer who covers AI. Prior to joining The Verge, she covered the crossroads between technology, banking, and the business.
A Baltimore County high school’s past athletic director and physical education teacher have been detained and accused of using an AI word cloning support to ensnare the principal.
According to The Baltimore Banner, Baltimore County authorities believe a recording of Pikesville High School principal Eric Eiswert making allegedly anti-Semitic and racist remarks that was made on social media in January was false. Experts told The Baltimore Banner and authorities that the recording, which recently resulted in Eiswert’s expulsion, has a “flat tone, exceptionally clear background sounds, and lack of regular breathing sounds or pauses”.
Baltimore County police identified Dazhon Darien, a previous athletic director at the institution whose name was even mentioned in the audio clip, as the source of the recording. He allegedly used school computers to search for “OpenAI tools.” What AI word platform did Darien reportedly use, it is unclear. On Thursday at the airport, Darien was detained, and according to WBAL TV 11, “investigators believe Darien made the recording in retaliation against Eiswert, who was at the time looking into the possible misuse of university money.”
As the solutions become more effective at sounding more man, interest in AI-powered word cloning technologies has grown over the past season. However, these programs have likewise induced warm water in users. The social gathering of Imran Khan, the jailed former prime minister of Pakistan, used ElevenLabs, a famous economically accessible text-to-voice generation platform, to recreate his voice during the campaign. A fake robocall that purported to be President Joe Biden telling people not to vote was connected to two Texas businesses. The use of AI robocalls was prohibited by the Federal Communications Commission in February. And of course, the fake Drake used AI to create the song “Heart on My Sleeve”.
In this fraught environment, OpenAI decided in March to withhold its AI text-to-voice generation platform, Voice Engine, from public use. The service, which only requires a 15-minute audio clip to clone someone’s voice, is only available to a limited number of researchers due to the lack of guardrails around the technology.
US lawmakers have filed, but not yet passed, several bills like the No Fakes Act and the No AI Fraud Act that seek to prevent technology companies from using an individual’s face, voice, or name without their permission.
