Fact check: Tuition fees and AI-generated voter videos - The Independent
Ahead of the 2026 Scottish and Welsh parliamentary elections and English local elections, a video presenting fake people as real voters was shared online.
- Incident date
- May 2026
- Target
- Scottish and Welsh parliamentary elections and English local elections
A video surfaced online ahead of the 2026 Scottish and Welsh parliamentary elections and English local elections that purported to show real voters expressing their opinions. However, the video was determined to be AI-generated.
What happened
The video, which was later deleted, featured a presenter interviewing people on the street about their voting preferences. All of the interviewees stated they would vote for Reform UK, except for one who favored Restore. Fact-checkers discovered that both the video and audio contained SynthID, an invisible watermark indicating content created or altered with Google’s AI tools. Additional clues suggesting the video's artificial nature included unusual writing on a bus stop, a bus with an improbable destination, and a shop named “Local Shop”. The sharing of such AI-generated content without proper disclosure risks undermining democratic processes by deceiving voters.