A new series of online videos showing Berkshire Hathaway’s (NYSE: BRK.A) CEO Warren Buffett giving financial advice are artificial intelligence-fueled fakes.
In a press statement, Berkshire Hathaway declared the videos create showing photos of Buffett carry a “very flat monotone voice” that sounds nothing like the billionaire investor.
“Mr. Buffett is concerned that these types of fraudulent videos are becoming a spreading virus,” said the company. “Individuals who are less familiar with Mr. Buffett may believe these videos are real and be misled by the contents of these videos.”
The statement added that Buffett “has rarely commented publicly since Berkshire’s shareholder’s meeting last May.”
A link to one of the fake YouTube videos can be seen here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jJ3ZHkZF13s.
Photo: Screen shot of one of the fake Warren Buffett videos
I see the video has been removed. There is a “plethora” of videos using Mr. Buffett’s picture to entice people into believing the advice is from him. The next step is that someone will develop a “Buffett A.I.” that mimics him completely.
I was intreged by a good deal of the financial advice put forth on a number of the youtube sites using Mr. Buffetts images and sounding like his gravely voice. Then I started to notice some of the “advice” seemed contradictory. And none of them seemed to be connected to Mr. Buffett, or to Berkshire-Hattaway. I wondered why someone of Mr. Buffett’s wealth and renown would even consider selling his likeness to so many different people to use in promoting content that was supposedly attributed to him. And that the posting web-sights were sponsered by an ever growing number of posting entities.
Now I know!