South Korea battles deepfake surge ahead of presidential election

Removal efforts fall behind as takedown requests spike tenfold from 2024 levels

20250529 South Korea Deepfake

South Korean election commission officials check deepfake images on May 20. (Photo by Ahn Seong-bok)

TETSUYA FUJITA

SEOUL -- South Korea's election authorities and law enforcement are scrambling to tackle a surge in deepfake videos ahead of the June 3 presidential election.

In mid-April, the campaign team of opposition frontrunner Lee Jae-myung, the presidential candidate for South Korea's opposition Democratic Party, revealed it had received reports of a deepfake video in which Lee appears to hurl verbal abuse at his wife, Kim Hye-kyung.

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