Hey, have you seen Zoom’s new AI avatar feature? It’s supposed to make a digital version of you that talks for you!

Yeah, I heard about that! You can create a photorealistic avatar that syncs with your voice. It’s supposed to make video chatting faster, especially for work.

Sounds cool! But… how does it work? Does the avatar just talk for you?

Kind of. You record a video of yourself, and then you can type what you want your avatar to say. Zoom generates the audio and syncs it with your avatar’s lip movements.

Wow, that could save so much time. But… is it safe? Could people use it for bad stuff, like creating fake videos?

That’s exactly what some people are worried about. There’s a risk of deepfakes — people could make fake videos of others saying things they never said.

Yikes! Imagine someone using my avatar to scam people. Does Zoom have any protections against that?

Zoom says they’re building in safeguards, like watermarks and advanced authentication, but they haven’t shared many details. And watermarks can be edited out easily.

Yeah, that doesn’t sound foolproof. Deepfakes are already a big problem online, and this could make it even easier to trick people.

Exactly. There are already deepfakes of famous people like President Biden and Taylor Swift. It’s hard to know what’s real or fake anymore, and AI tools like this could make it worse.

I guess they’ll need really strict rules to make sure no one misuses it. Maybe only trusted users should have access.

That’s a good idea. Some other companies, like Microsoft, already require users to get permission before creating avatars, and maybe Zoom will do something similar.

It’s crazy how tech can be so helpful but also so risky at the same time. I mean, it’s great for work, but what about the darker side of it?

Yeah, it’s a double-edged sword. On one hand, it could save time and improve productivity. But on the other hand, there’s a real danger of misuse if the right precautions aren’t in place.

I guess we’ll have to wait and see how they handle it. Hopefully, they take security seriously before releasing it.

Let’s hope so! With deepfakes already causing so much trouble, the last thing we need is a new way to create them without strong protections.