Humans can be trained to spot AI faces, helping fight deepfake fraud

Summary

A study led by the Australian National University (ANU) Emotions and Faces Lab has shown that humans can be trained to improve their ability to spot AI-generated faces. Deepfake faces have become so realistic that they are hard to distinguish from real photos, contributing to AI-related fraud. The training, which focuses on six perceptual qualities—distinctiveness, memorability, proportionality, symmetry, attractiveness, and expressiveness—improved all participants' detection accuracy, with high performers achieving near perfection. The training was effective for StyleGAN faces, and researchers are now testing its generalizability. The study was successfully replicated by a team at the University of Victoria, Canada.