Spitting Images: Tracking Deepfakes and Generative AI in Elections

In 2024, more than 60 countries representing approximately 49% of the global population will hold national elections, making this the biggest election year in history. At the same time, generative artificial intelligence has democratized the ability to create realistic fake or altered images, videos, and audio recordings—including those of political candidates. GMF’s Spitting Images: Tracking Deepfakes and Generative AI in Elections map is an interactive tool that tracks the spread and impact of major deepfake campaigns around global elections.   

The tracker’s start date is September 1, 2023, about one month prior to Slovakia’s September 30 parliamentary elections. In the days leading up to this election, deepfake clips spread across social media, purportedly capturing Slovakia’s liberal party leader discussing politically damaging topics such as vote rigging and raising the price of beer. This highly visible instance of generative AI electoral interference marked one of the first publicly recognized and extensively covered deepfake uses ahead of the 2024 election cycle.  

For each deepfake instance, the map tracks information including category (audio, image, video, or mixed), timeline of deployment, associated elections and countries, and related media coverage. The map also provides brief descriptions of each instance. Users can quickly discern the spread and types of deepfakes influencing elections in 2024. So far, GMF Technology has tracked 133 deepfakes related to over a third of the elections since the tracker started.  

Spitting Images is continuously updated by the GMF Technology team to reflect new media coverage of electoral deepfakes. The dataset behind the interactive map is based on open-source information. The map is a living document, and we welcome electoral deepfake submissions, feedback, insights, or documented corrections to keep it up to date and accurate. Please email any feedback or additional instances for inclusion in the tracker to [email protected]. See the full methodology here and the full screen map here. 

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