A lawmaker’s name trended on Twitter Philippines and Reddit after an audio recording with his voice circulated on social media.
The name “Villafuerte” referring to Rep. Luis Raymund Villafuerte (Camarines Sur) reached the trending topics of Twitter Philippines on April 8. As of writing, there are 13,000 tweets under it as Twitter users talk about the audio clip.
The surname is also tagged as “popular now” on Facebook.
The recording captured a supposed conversation between Villafuerte and a woman. Villafuerte’s voice could be heard instructing the woman to create or edit images of a presidential candidate.
The origin of the audio recording has not yet been determined. The solon, however, had since reacted about the circulating audio recording on March 27.
In a lengthy Facebook post, Villafuerte denied it was him whose voice was in the viral record. He claimed that the person behind it edited it and used the “deep fake” method.
The lawmaker also attached a video tutorial about this technology on his post.
“Meron kinakalat ang aming mga kalaban na DEEP Fake audio recording na ako daw nasa recording. Mag Google lang po kayo at mag search sa YouTube. Nanduon kung paano i-fake o gayahin ang boses mo exacto,” Villafuerte said.
He said that he had already reported this to the authorities.
Furthermore, Villafuerte also offered money to anyone who will give him information concerning the people behind a page called Ratsada Rinconada Bicol and other similar accounts he accused of spreading false information about him.
Deepfake technology, whether deep faked photo or voice, has been making headlines since 2019 as it is being used for criminal activities.
The term comes from an advanced tool called “deep learning,” a form of artificial intelligence, to mimic or copy voices and faces.
Audio recording
Meanwhile, Ratsada Rinconada Bicol, the page Villafuerte mentioned, was the account that shared the audio clip in video form last week.
The post received 2,900 reactions, 672 comments and 144,000 views so far. It is also still accessible as of writing.
The video was later posted on Reddit Philippines or r/Philippines on April 7. The post had since earned 1,848 upvotes on the forum.
Some Twitter users also shared it on the micro-blogging platform. It quickly spread across social media platforms on Friday.
Details of the conversation
According to the supposed taped call, Villafuerte ordered the woman to edit images of presidential candidate Vice President Leni Robredo with her supporters.
It could also be heard that the man in the audio told the woman to put the word “election scammer” on their pictures.
One Twitter user shared a screenshot of a graphic that could possibly be the one Villafuerte had instructed the woman to make. The graphic was uploaded last February.
“Ito po ung kumalat before na ads,” the Twitter user said.
Some users, meanwhile, were not convinced by Villafuerte’s deep fake claim.
“Imposible po yung deepfake. Di po kaya ng technology as of now yung tone at nuances ng Tagalog. Tsaka po kailangan ng thousands of samples to create one simple sentence,” one user said.
“Problem Cong. Villafuerte is that emotions can’t be faked by Deep AI,” another user tweeted.
When asked about this controversy, Robredo remained confident that the Bicolanos knew her as a person. She, however, refused to comment on the alleged audio clip, citing that it is not yet verified.
“Alam mo yung mga tao sa’min kilala ako. Kahit anong paninira kilala nila kung sino ako. Di magtatagumpay yun,” she told reporters.
