Senator Ben Cardin was targeted by a sophisticated deepfake operation where someone used AI technology to impersonate Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba in a Zoom call, attempting to elicit politically charged responses about the upcoming election and U.S. foreign policy.
In September 2024, Senator Ben Cardin, the Democratic chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, received an email from someone claiming to be Dmytro Kuleba, Ukraine's former Foreign Minister. During the subsequent Zoom video call on September 19, the person appeared and sounded consistent with Kuleba from past encounters. However, Cardin became suspicious when the caller began asking politically charged questions about the upcoming election and pressing for responses to sensitive foreign policy questions, particularly asking 'Do you support long range missiles into Russian territory? I need to know your answer.' The caller was attempting to bait the Senator into commenting on political candidates. Cardin and his staff ended the call and contacted the State Department, which confirmed it was not actually Kuleba. The incident involved sophisticated deepfake technology that used artificial intelligence to create realistic video and audio impersonation. The FBI is investigating the matter, and Senate security officials have warned other lawmakers about similar attempts. Intelligence sources suspect involvement from foreign actors, potentially Russia, China, or Iran. The incident has raised concerns about the increasing sophistication of deepfake technology targeting high-profile political figures, particularly ahead of the November 2024 elections.
Domain classification, causal taxonomy, severity scores, and national security assessments were LLM-classified and may contain errors.
Using AI systems to conduct large-scale disinformation campaigns, malicious surveillance, or targeted and sophisticated automated censorship and propaganda, with the aim of manipulating political processes, public opinion, and behavior.
AI system
Due to a decision or action made by an AI system
Intentional
Due to an expected outcome from pursuing a goal
Post-deployment
Occurring after the AI model has been trained and deployed