X deletes accounts of networks that defame politicians with deepfakes

Social media site X has taken action against a network that defamed British politicians, including Labour’s Wes Streeting, with manipulated clips, deleting several accounts and posts.

Previously, a BBC investigation as part of its “Undercover Voter” project uncovered how a group of accounts had created and shared deepfake images in the run-up to the general election.

The accounts then posted misleading comments to reinforce the impression that the clips were real.

This is the first time in over 12 months that X has responded to the allegations I raised against them. I have contacted them more than a dozen times previously without receiving a response.

Elon Musk bought the social media company formerly known as Twitter in 2022 and made several changes to the site.

This resulted in massive job cuts, including in the social media site’s communications team.

Previously, emails to X’s press office triggered an automatic reply with a poop emoji. Now the automatic reply is: “I’m busy right now, please check back later.”

A spokesman for X told the BBC: “X has a number of policies and measures in place to protect the debate around the election.

“We will label content that violates our synthetic and manipulated media policies and remove accounts engaged in platform manipulation or other serious violations of our rules.”

While some of the fake clips and comments shared by this group of accounts on X were obviously absurd and satirical, others falsely portrayed candidates as making politically damaging statements.

In the comments, the X-user network tries to make them appear credible. The videos have already been viewed tens of thousands of times.

One of the posts included a doctored video of Wes Streeting, the shadow health secretary, on the BBC’s Politics Live programme. When the presenter is talking about politician Diane Abbott, the footage sounds like Mr Streeting is quietly saying “stupid woman” – but he never said that.

The clip was shared by a user called Men for Wes, who took to the comments to express his outrage at the “really nasty people” in the Labour Party. Other users flocked to the comments to confirm the clip was genuine. Mr Streeting condemned the clip as fake.

Several hours after they were posted, Mr Streeting’s doctored clips were flagged as fake by X’s reader-powered fact-checking service. These accounts also posted fake clips of Labour candidate Luke Akehurst, Keir Starmer and Reform UK leader Nigel Farage.

After my investigation, X’s Men for Wes account has been suspended and the videos from this account are no longer visible on the site. Some of the other profiles have also been removed.

An X spokesperson also told the BBC that more than “500,000 contributors in 70 countries” participate in Community Notes, X’s reader-driven fact-checking service.

In the UK, the social media company said it “supports efforts to increase digital literacy during the election period”.