Dutch Police Create Deepfake Video of Murdered Boy In Hope of New Leads (theguardian.com) 43
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Guardian: Dutch police have received dozens of leads after using deepfake technology to virtually bring to life a teenager almost two decades after his murder. Sedar Soares was shot dead in 2003 while throwing snowballs with friends in the parking lot of a Rotterdam metro station. The 13-year-old's murder baffled police for years. Now, with the permission of Sedar's family, they have made a video in which the teen asks the public to help solve the cold-case crime.
In what Dutch police believe could be a world first, an eerily lifelike image of Sedar appears in the video as he greets the camera and picks up a football. Accompanied by stirring music, he walks through a guard of honor on the field, comprising his relatives, former teachers and friends. "Somebody must know who murdered my darling brother. That's why he has been brought back to life for this film," a voice says, before Sedar stops and drops his ball. "Do you know more? Then speak," Sedar and his relatives and friends say, before his image disappears from the field and the video gives the police contact details. Dutch police have posted the deepfake video on YouTube. You can also watch the making of the video in the documentary "Speak! Now!"
In what Dutch police believe could be a world first, an eerily lifelike image of Sedar appears in the video as he greets the camera and picks up a football. Accompanied by stirring music, he walks through a guard of honor on the field, comprising his relatives, former teachers and friends. "Somebody must know who murdered my darling brother. That's why he has been brought back to life for this film," a voice says, before Sedar stops and drops his ball. "Do you know more? Then speak," Sedar and his relatives and friends say, before his image disappears from the field and the video gives the police contact details. Dutch police have posted the deepfake video on YouTube. You can also watch the making of the video in the documentary "Speak! Now!"
Re: And (Score:1)
I was thinking if at least one of the teachers or staff had a gun on them (suprising they didn't considering this is Texas) they could've shot the shooter before the body count got so high.
"Duck and cover and hope the police arrive soon" didn't work in this situation.
Also, there has been a huge upsurge in mass shootings as of late. As in at least one almost every week, and America has always been flooded with guns, and we weren't hearing about this happening decades ago. And up until very recently mass shoo
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I'm happy for you though. Or sorry that happened.
Re: And as usual malys2 is a deluded lying cunt. (Score:1)
"Ah, the utterly discredited good guy with a gun excuse, you think more guns = safety"
It keeps the dishonest honest. Hitler got rid of guns, and so did Lenin and Stalin, Mao, and many others. How did that work out for the people in those countries?
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It keeps the dishonest honest. Hitler got rid of guns, and so did Lenin and Stalin, Mao, and many others. How did that work out for the people in those countries?
The alternate way to look at that is to ask how well having a bunch of guns worked out for people in those countries in the end. It does not seem to have saved them from tyranny. If they had decided to stand up against tyranny with their guns, Hitler, Lenin and Stalin had tanks and bombers. Also worth noting is that it looks like Hitler largely just disarmed the minorities that they wanted to murder. They had the support of most of the typical population segment that usually cares a lot about gun ownership
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I was thinking if at least one of the teachers or staff had a gun on them (suprising they didn't considering this is Texas) they could've shot the shooter before the body count got so high.
Yes, because none of the staff would ever start a mass-shooting by themselves.
I still think your logic is flawed.
Re: And (Score:1)
If there is a student already blasting away his school chums, and he is intent on killing as many people as he can, I don't see how this could make it much worse.
Yeah, all of the armchair quarterbacks (including myself) come out of the woodwork when something like this happens, but if one of the teachers were armed and trained in the proper use of firearms, the shooter might have been taken out before he was able to kill as many people as he did.
Re: And (Score:2)
"Yes, because none of the staff would ever start a mass-shooting by themselves."
Yes that could happen, and a teacher can just as easily build a bomb and hide it inside a cabinet and blow himself and his entire class up.
So it comes down to the likelyhood of a student gunning down students vs a teacher doing the same. And so far all of these mass shootings were done by students. With that said, I would feel better with a teacher who is armed and properly trained who would drop the mass shooter
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I was thinking if at least one of the teachers or staff had a gun on them (suprising they didn't considering this is Texas) they could've shot the shooter before the body count got so high.
Well, _all_ of the police officers there had guns on them, but that doesn't seem to have done the trick. Not until he had killed 21 people, anyway. The details are still vague, but it's sounding like the police actually chased him into the school, but then stayed outside, concerned about being shot while he murdered children in the school. In the other recent big mass shooting that just happened, the shooter exchanged fire with an armed guard and killed the guard. It turns out that a good guy with a gun is
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Extremely proud. You think about us nonstop yet I don't think about you at all.
That's how children act out, to get attention without regard for the consequences of their actions.
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interesting (Score:3)
Re: interesting (Score:3)
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They literally created new evidence.
Not really. It's a fact that this guy was murdered 20 years ago. People may have put that out of their minds by now. But this will jog their memory. The "new evidence" they would have to be careful with is the appearance of other people (his friends/acquaintances) in that video. Someone says "Yeah. I remember that guy's face." When it has only appeared in the context of this video.
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It's probably just that there are appeals like this all the time and they barely get a mention. There is so much news available, and it cycles through the system very fast. A novelty like this gets in front of eyeballs.
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Peoples memory is terrible evidence though. There are an innumerable number of people who were falsely convicted of crimes they didn't commit because some well meaning person miss-remembered, and accused an innocent person of committing the crime.
Manufacturing compelling footage such as this should be very troubling, as it taints any new information that may come forward.
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If done properly, it won't.
For example, the deepfake could be the victim themselves - the last video would be of 20 years ago, so manufact
Legitimizing deep fakes (Score:2)
And so the rapid downhill ride begins...
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They may be hoping for something other than a witness, such as someone who heard the murderer talking about having shot a child in the years since then.
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Saw the video (Score:2)
Holy shit it looked creepy as fuck. Way down deep in the uncanny valley. He also looks like he wants to murder the viewer.
"Recovered memories" (Score:3)
For some reason this brings back the issue of "recovered memories" that wound up putting a lot of innocent people in prison, and got them slammed with some truly horrific labels.
Interesting, but...human memory? (Score:2)
Human memory is notoriously fallible, even a few minutes after an event. After 20 years? People can convince themselves (or others) of basically anything. "Hey, didn't you play there as a kid? Remember any violence?" Any maybe you did, you saw some kids having a fight, and your brain enhances those memories, maybe there was a gun, maybe there was a stranger, maybe there was... Pretty soon, you have remembered things that never happened [psychologytoday.com].
If they get anything out of this effort, it is likely to be a lot of i
Best case scenario? (Score:3)
This would be someone who was with the shooter at the time but has been suppressing their knowledge decides to come forward with the information they've been hiding for years. Yes, there are lots of dangers here, but that best case is worth aiming at.