Discover and read the best of Twitter Threads about #BernReturn
Most recents (2)
We've done a decent amount of research on the use of GAN-generated images over the last two years, mostly fake face "photos" such as those produced by thispersondoesnotexist(dot)com. Here are all of our related threads in one place.
cc: @ZellaQuixote
cc: @ZellaQuixote
GAN is an abbreviation for "generative adversarial network", the AI technique used to produce these images (and other things). Here's a "brief" description of how StyleGAN, the GAN behind thispersondoesnotexist(dot)com, works.
machinelearningmastery.com/introduction-t…
machinelearningmastery.com/introduction-t…
Here's the first network we found in the wild using GAN-generated face pics (29 of 52 accounts, created in two batches). The profiles featured repetitive biographies mentioning family, friends, country, and weapons.
In case you missed it at the time (we did) there was a false claim pushed under the hashtag #BernReturn that @BernieSanders was refunding campaign donations after he dropped out of the race. A bunch of accounts with GAN-generated face pics participated.
cc: @ZellaQuixote
cc: @ZellaQuixote
The #BernReturn operation originated on 4chan, and quite frankly wasn't coordinated terribly well. Whoever suggested searching for other people's #BernReturn tweets and liking them should probably have mentioned retweeting them too (almost all tweets got likes, few got retweets.) 
We found twelve accounts with GAN-generated faces and tweets falsely claiming Bernie Sanders was refunding campaign donations. Based on variety in language and schedule, we suspect multiple people independently saw the 4chan posts and chose to use GAN-generated pics.
