Framing Brand Safety for the AI Age Around Protect, Detect & Correct

Brand safety is a trillion-dollar problem. Fraud, misinformation, and disinformation, key components of the shadow content eating away at the foundations of trust in the digital landscape. 

While deep-fake videos and manipulated images get most of the attention, this is just one dimension of the issues companies and individuals face today in a world in which we can no longer tell what is or is not true or authentic across communications channels. 

As I write in a new Tauth Labs Issue Brief, Framing Digital Safety in the AI Age: Protect, Detect & Correct,  “We hate to be Chicken Little, but if nothing is done, the sky will fall. Without trust in digital content there is no economy or democracy.” 

The world’s leading technology and media companies recognize the threats and are working to address them. Content authentication technology standards developed by the Coalition of Content Provenance and Authenticity (C2PA), are a foundation for building trust into content.

The potential risk to reputations and bottom lines of fraudulent content should provide motivation enough to take action, but unless these issues are framed in ways in which leaders feel they can do something, we will fail. 

AI slop is a too-big-to-solve problem. Focusing on shadow content – by definition malicious fake content designed to deceive - gets at the core issue facing individual companies. It provides a path to specific solutions including content authentication. 

But if we see everything through the lens of one solution, there’s a risk of offering a one-dimensional silver bullet that can be dodged “Matrix-like.” 

In the new issue brief, I make the case that communicators should be looking at digital safety in terms of three buckets: Protect, Detect and Correct. This provides a multi-dimensional framework for addressing the challenge of fraudulent content with both technology and communications tools. 

Protect includes cybersecurity, content authentication, and education. How we think about cybersecurity needs to be extended to protect content when it is shared outside “owned” technology systems. 

Since content authentication provides the ability to differentiate between what is authentic and what is not at the level of a digital file it has a key role to play when it comes to the protection of content, companies, and clients. It also provides a means for social media platforms, content aggregators, trading platforms, and LLMs, to differentiate and prioritize authentic content – adding value to it.

Detect is where most of the focus of the industry has been to date. In a world where the ability to create fraudulent and synthetic content is widespread, shadow content will still be prevalent. Today’s detection tools not only help with the identification of fraudulent content but help communicators take steps to address it.    

Correct is a challenge. Getting content taken down in a timely matter is complex and time consuming, and a reason why automation of responses to fraudulent content is important. These challenges underscore the continued importance of “human” crisis communications responses.

Communicators and their agencies are doing the important work of preparing clients for AI crises, building out responses and solutions. Counter-programming in the form of press statements and outreach are an important part of the tool kit. 

The power of the idea of Shadow Content is that it focuses legislators, companies, and technologists on a solvable problem. Protect, Detect and Correct frames solutions in a way that is consistent with the need for multi-layered solutions. “So, when stones are thrown at the technology, the panes of the glass house do not shatter – because they are laminated.” 

Content authentication has a role to play across the protect, detect, and correct framing we have detailed here. Implementing the technology is not only a defense mechanism, but also a business opportunity, because it is about making content more valuable and more likely to be prioritized in the technology landscape.   

Understanding its value to protect brands, provides an opportunity to start client conversations around trust and ways in which it can be built into content, as well as steps to take to prepare for, implement detection strategies, and address issues when they arise.