All of the GitHub projects found by WIRED are at least partially built on code related to videos on the Deep Porn streaming site. Repositories exist all over the web as part of the web of open source software that can be used to make fake deep porn, but due to its open nature it cannot be kept a gate. GitHub repositories can be copied, known as “forks”, and from there freely adjusted by developers.
“When we look at intimate image exploitation, the vast majority of tools and weaponized uses have come from the open source space,” says Azhder. But they often start with well-intentioned developers, he says. “Someone creates something they think is cool or interesting, and someone with bad intentions recognizes its malevolent potential and turns it into a weapon.”
Some, like August’s disabled repository, have purposeful communities around them for explicit uses. Azder claims that the model sees itself as a tool for deepfake porn and becomes a “funnel” of abuse that mainly targets women.
Other videos uploaded to the porn streaming site by the AI models credit account downloaded from GitHub feature the faces of popular Deepfake targets, celebrities Emma Watson, Taylor Swift, and Anya Taylor-Joy, as well as other less famous but very real women. they give , is placed in sexual situations.
The developers freely described the tools they used, including two that were removed by GitHub but whose code remains in other repositories.
Deepfake-seeking criminals congregate in many places online, including secret community forums on Discord and in plain sight on Reddit, and combine deepfake prevention efforts. One Redditor offered his services using the repository software archived on September 29th. “Can someone do my cousin,” asked another.
Torrents of the original repository banned by GitHub in August are also available in other corners of the web, showing how difficult it is to control open source Deepfake software around the world. Other deepfake porn tools, such as the DeepNude app, have similarly been removed before new versions appear.
“There are so many models, so many different forks in the models, so many different versions that it can be difficult to keep track of them all,” says Elizabeth Seger, director of digital policy at the UK think tank Demos. “Once a model is made open source for public download, there is no way to make it public again,” he adds.
The creator of deepfake porn, featuring 13 candidly manipulated videos of female celebrities, is encouraging responsible use of a prominent GitHub repository marketed as a “NSFW” version of another project, and explicitly asks users to use it. Do not use it for nudity. Their YouTube profile brazenly states, “All Face Swap AI training from GitHUB, no online services.”
GitHub had already disabled this NSFW version when WIRED identified the deepfake videos. But other tanks, billed as “locked” versions of the model, were available on the platform on January 10, including one with 2,500 “stars.”
This is technically true once [a model is] It cannot be reversed there. But we can still make it harder for people to access.”
