Kominfo Ministry Asserts Jokowi's Speech in Chinese Produced by Deepfake

TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - A video displaying President Joko "Jokowi" Widodo delivering a speech using fluent Chinese language went viral on social media. The Ministry of Communication and Information (Kominfo) confirmed that it was misleading content produced by artificial intelligence or AI.

“It’s misleading content,” the ministry’s Director General of Informatics Applications, Semuel Abrijani Pangerapan, said in the Kominfo office, Central Jakarta, on Thursday, Oct. 26.

The ministry found similarities between the recent video with the caption 'Jokowi speaks Mandarin' and the video uploaded by the YouTube channel of the U.S.-Indonesia Society (USINDO) on November 13, 2015.

“Visually, the videos are identical, but [the latest one] has been edited in a way that allegedly uses AI-deep fake technology,” Semuel stressed.

Semuel mentioned the link to the original video: https://usindo.org/gala/dinner-in-honor-of-president-joko-widodo. It was shown that Jokowi did not use Mandarin during his speech, but the Indonesian language, which concluded that the recently circulated video was a hoax or disinformation.

Semuel appealed to the public to be critical when receiving information that can be manipulated. He also warned people to refrain from spreading false content in any form of digital platforms. “Kominfo Ministry urges the public to always refer to trusted sources such as government websites and credible media.”

MARIA FRANSISCA LAHUR