Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
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Andy O'Donoghue joins us now for Tech Thursday. Andy, we will talk in a moment about deliberate use of deke fake video scams. But before we get to that, tell us about the new training course, available I think to almost everybody, been provided by the government into artificial intelligence.
A fantastic initiative, I think, Matt, and developed by SOLUS. Yes, that's right.
Chapter 2: What concerns were raised about AI deepfakes by Simon Harris?
It's called AI Ready and it is a free national AI skills platform aiming and the aim is to train a million learners across Ireland. And the great thing here about it, I think, is that the courses require absolutely zero technical background and there's no need to use any paid tools. And I checked on AI Ready.ie
And because people obviously would have a concern, oh, I don't have a subscription to ChatGPT or Anthropic. And they do make the point that the free versions are perfectly good and perfectly suitable for the courses. So it is a fantastic, it's a fantastic idea.
And it's part of the AI here for good strategy, which I think this is aimed at people who haven't been exposed to AI in the workplace, but know that maybe it's useful, maybe it's handy. But I also think it's for all of us as citizens and consumers just to understand a little bit more, particularly as we live in a world where AI really is here for good.
So all you need to do this is a laptop or a phone, is it?
Chapter 3: What is the new AI training course introduced in the episode?
Exactly. Ideally a laptop because, you know, you're going to get the big screen. But again, AI Ready Go, they make the point that if you have a tablet or a phone, sign up, get started. The sign up process is very easy. You do have to sign up to get started. But I think, you know, we live in a time where this is an incredibly useful tool and it's wonderful that it's free, Matt.
Is it interactive or is it just looking at a video explaining how things work?
No, it is interactive. And the courses, and there are various courses. And I signed up today. And I got to say, the broad range of content, and I thought really useful to kind of help people, whether you're using, maybe you're just using Copilot here, you know, in your Microsoft Office apps, just understanding a little bit about how AI works, how to build prompts.
how, you know, how privacy is part of this AI story. So interactive and really easy to use. Yeah. And nice and short, Matt.
Okay. You're making it sound like AI or day-to-day use of it is inevitable, is it?
Our use of AI is inevitable. And it's funny because I often hear, you know, there was kind of this idea that people are talking about, you know, AI bears and AI bulls. There's not much point in being an AI bear at the moment. And it's something maybe it's a term that was applied to the valuations of these companies. But we can't afford to be AI bears.
We may not like some of the things that are happening that AI is being applied to do, either for good or bad, or whether by governments or whether by bad actors. But AI is going to be part of our life.
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Chapter 4: How can beginners engage with the AI Ready course?
It's already affecting the jobs market. And in both positive and negative ways. So we do need to I think we need to accept that it's here. But then we also have to be sure that, you know, our governments are going to legislate in a useful and quick way that helps keep citizens protected as we go on with this journey.
Okay, well, I didn't get a chance to ask him about it when he was on the programme yesterday. I didn't get a chance to get to a lot of things I would have liked to have got to. But the Minister for Finance, Antonis Simon-Harris, yesterday was at a conference and he said deep-faked videos portraying him endorsing fraudulent investment products
were so convincing he had to watch them twice to ensure they weren't real. Now, I think the TikTok tóniste has made so many videos at this stage, maybe he's forgotten which ones he's actually made. But this idea that something that he didn't make, using presumably his face and his voice, that they can be so real that even he's confused by them is just baffling.
It really is, Matt. And, you know, he made the point, obviously entirely fabricated, but the tournament made the point that he had to watch it twice to check that it wasn't him. And it's funny because you see, it was it was very cleverly done. I mean, this is a clever, clever hack because it followed the announcements about the state run savings and investment scheme.
And of course, then when you see the Tornister in a video promoting investments, people, you know, could easily make the association and the assumption that he is endorsing this particular product. Oh, maybe it's part of that thing I heard about in the news.
Which, sorry, just to say, which will not be announced until next October's budget, what it is. But he's been speaking about it so often. Maybe there are people who think, oh, maybe has that been announced and released now?
Yeah, exactly. And he is not the first person I have seen. And I'm not going to say what ad platform or what websites I saw them on because I screenshotted them and I reported them to the tech companies who hosted these ads. But I have seen other well-known Irish celebrities and politicians endorsing usually crypto scams.
But they're served on very reputable websites using, you know, some of the world's biggest ad technology. And I mean, truly baffling to see them. And the Tornisher made the point when he was talking about this, that tech companies and social media, they are enablers if they don't take action in relation to this.
Because if somebody's paying for these ads to be posted and they're posted, tech companies, of course, they have a responsibility to not enable these type of scams. And they can't turn their back on that. It's really important that they act, Matt.
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