Social media biggie snaps up deepfake startup

Snapchat's parent company Snap has reportedly acquired AI Factory, an image and voice recognition startup for its deepfake-style technology.

As Variety notes, Snap used AI Factory's tech to build the newly released Cameos feature that allows users to insert a selfie onto a singing bird, a talking cat, even onto other people and share as a looping video.

Snap reportedly paid AI Factory USD 166 million under the deal.

Deepfake is a growing threat in the age of online bullying and harassment. With the technology getting perfected to the level of generating deepfake videos of even politicians, the US Congress is investigating to prevent fake news campaigns ahead of the 2020 US presidential race.