Microsoft rolled out new technologies as a way to confront and identify the influence of manipulated media. One technology named as Microsoft Video Authenticator helps in analyzing photos and videos and reflects the percentage of how it has been changed, the company said in a blog post. The other technology helps creators add hashes and certificates to the content made in Microsoft as well as a reader can check the authentication.

These two identifications, hashes, and certificates will let the users know the real creator of the content. Also, they can verify that it has been changed or not.

“We expect that methods for generating synthetic media will continue to grow in sophistication. As all AI detection methods have rates of failure, we have to understand and be ready to respond to deepfakes that slip through detection methods. Thus, in the longer term, we must seek stronger methods for maintaining and certifying the authenticity of news articles and other media. There are few tools today to help assure readers that the media they’re seeing online came from a trusted source and that it wasn’t altered,” Microsoft said in a post.

Lawmakers and experts have already raised the issues regarding the manipulation of media, especially when they were forged using artificial intelligence and machine learning. It has proved to work well in spreading political misinformation. So, Microsoft, as a remedy, announced to partner with the nonprofit AI Foundation to create new video authentication software. It will also partner with BBC, CBC, and The New York Times on a new project to test its authentication technology.

“We’re also partnering with the University of Washington (UW), Sensity and USA Today on media literacy. Improving media literacy will help people sort disinformation from genuine facts and manage risks posed by deepfakes and cheap fakes. Practical media knowledge can enable us all to think critically about the context of media and become more engaged citizens while still appreciating satire and parody. Though not all synthetic media is bad, even a short intervention with media literacy resources has been shown to help people identify it and treat it more cautiously,” added Microsoft’s spokesperson.

The digital hashes can address ever the small fakes such as cropping and slowing down of videos. Such changes are done by political parties during campaigns to score more on social media.