Russian bots use fake Tom Cruise for Olympic disinformation

‘Paris’ is projected onto the Arc de Triomphe to celebrate the entry into the Olympic year, during the New Year's celebrations on the Champs Elysees avenue in Paris, France, Jan 1, 2024. In addition to disinformation, hackers probably began first probing IT systems linked to the Games for weaknesses about a year ago and then began ramping up actual attacks four months before the Games to try and disrupt them, experts say. — Reuters

A pro-Russian propaganda effort is using artificial intelligence as part of a vast operation to suggest that violence is likely to occur at the upcoming Olympic Games in Paris, according to Microsoft Corp findings released June 2.

One disinformation group used fake AI-generated audio to make it appear as if actor Tom Cruise had narrated a video titled Olympics Has Fallen, modelled after the 2013 action movie Olympus Has Fallen, researchers found. The video, which spread in the fall of 2023, presented itself as a Netflix Inc documentary, including with the use of Netflix’s signature introduction that the company uses on all of its streaming videos.