Pakistan’s former leader Imran Khan uses AI to campaign from behind bars

In the video, Khan — who was jailed in August on corruption charges — greets his supporters and likens his time in prison to a fight for the freedom of Pakistan.

“PTI is not allowed to hold worker conventions or gatherings. Our people are being oppressed, and their families are also being harassed,” Khan says, urging Pakistanis to turn out to vote in the national election to be held Feb. 8. A caption on the video states that his voice was AI-generated and based on a script he approved from jail.

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Khan, who is also facing a separate trial on charges of revealing state secrets, maintains that the cases against him are attempts to remove him from politics.

The former cricket star, who rode to power in 2018 on an anti-corruption platform, was ousted in April 2022 after clashing with Pakistan’s powerful military leadership over nominations for key army positions and criticism of his government over soaring inflation and debt. Since then, Pakistani authorities have cracked down on his supporters and the PTI leadership while entangling Khan in dozens of legal cases.

A PTI representative, speaking on the condition of anonymity for their safety amid the ongoing arrests of party members, said the virtual rally and the use of AI helped make up for Khan’s absence from the campaign field ahead of the elections and a clampdown on political events organized by the party.

The nearlyfive-hour rally was viewed more than 1 million times each on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, the party said in a statement. “After this video, people are just up and running and getting ready for the election,” the party member said.

Ahead of the event, cybersecurity monitoring firm NetBlocks reported a nationwide disruption to social media platforms. “The incident is consistent with previous instances of internet censorship targeting opposition leader Imran Khan and his party PTI,” it said in an update. Pakistan’s telecommunications regulator said that it was investigating the outages but that overall connectivity appeared to be normal, according to Reuters.

The PTI member said the party would vet any further use of the AI technology, adding that they recognized it should not be misused by bad-faith actors pretending it iscoming from Khan.

Experts have warned about the use of AI to create images and videos that can be used to spread disinformation or propaganda. Hany Farid, a professor at the University of California at Berkeley who is a digital forensics and misinformation expert, said via email that besides better regulation and until the propensity to engage and amplify with hateful content online changes, “we are going to need better technology to distinguish the real from the fake.”

“There is no simple solution here — we need to make progress on all of these fronts,” Farid said.