Ahead of several major elections across the globe, Microsoft and OpenAI have announced the launch of a $2 million Societal Resilience Fund to further AI education and literacy among voters and vulnerable communities.

Two billion people across the world are set to vote in elections this year, but AI tools have made misinformation and the spread of fake news even more of a prolific problem threatening democracy.

The public, especially more vulnerable groups, therefore needs tools and information that will help people navigate an increasingly complex digital ecosystem confounded by AI advances and the proliferation of deepfakes.

The fund comes after several organisations have introduced tools to filter and flag AI-generated content and mitigate against the threat of deepfakes.

With these new tools, people can make realistic videos and images of politicians, and spread fake news more widely and convincingly.

Major tech companies, including Meta, Microsoft, Google, and OpenAI have started negotiations to establish a pact aimed at curtailing the spread of AI-generated content intended to deceive voters, launching an accord on deepfakes.

YouTube has introduced a tool to flag AI-generated content across their platform, and Meta has started doing the same to AI-generated images.

Google went so far as to restrict it’s AI chatbot, Gemini, from answering 2024 election-related queries in an effort to not circulate biased information, and to mitigate against people sharing fake answers as real.

Microsoft and OpenAI’s fund aims to provide education to the public via grants to several organisations including Older Adults Technology Services from AARP (OATS), the Coalition for Content Provenance and Authenticity (C2PA), International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (International IDEA) and Partnership on AI (PAI).

Recommended reading

• YouTube Introduces Tool to Flag AI Content Ahead of Global Elections
• OpenAI Is Trying to Stop AI Meddling in Elections. Will It Be Enough?
• Meta To Start Labelling AI-generated Images

In conjunction with this announcement, OpenAI has just launched a new tool to detect deepfakes for misinformation researchers. This tool is designed to aid in identifying fake images generated by DALL-E, OpenAI’s image generator.

“The launch of the Societal Resilience Fund is just one step that represents Microsoft and OpenAI’s commitment to address the challenges and needs in the AI literacy and education space,” a statement from OpenAI and Microsoft said.