How Marija Borkovic Became Dr. Emily Roberts in a Short Time – AI Creating “Great Experts” More Easily Than Even Politicians

When you attend a conference with a video address of a top expert the next time, pay close attention. Because, it could turn out that this great expert does not exist and that artificial intelligence is behind them.

That is precisely what happened to the visitors of the Serbian National Internet Domain Days, who were “addressed” by Dr. Emily Roberts, announced as a keynote speaker and prominent expert in the field of digital ethics and security, with an impressive biography.

Nothing seemed suspicious when a short video appearance of Dr. Roberts, talking about “Fighting Cyber Harassment in the Deepfake Era”, was played to the visitors in the hall.

– Deepfake has become a reason for worry due to the potentials for misuse – said Dr. Roberts and cited research confirming instances of cyber harassment.

To be fair, Dr. Roberts’ lecture was not particularly interesting and it was presented in a somewhat monotonous voice, but it wouldn’t be the first or the last time that an expert put the audience to sleep at a conference.

However, at the end of the lecture, as tabloids report, something shocking occurred. Emily transformed into another woman, Marijana Borkovic, the communications manager of the Serbian National Internet Domain Foundation, the organizer of the Serbian National Internet Domain Days.

Coming out on the stage, Marijana explained that Dr. Emily Roberts in fact didn’t exist.

– We have decided to show what AI looks like in practice and that, today, it is possible to have a generated keynote speaker at a conference. Dr. Emily was entirely generated by artificial intelligence, ChatGPT generated her name and surname, her origin, expertise, even the text I read – Borkovic pointed out.



The man behind the idea, the creative technologist Dane Blacic, explained that Emily had been created in only six hours with the help of seven tools, two of which were not AI-based. ChatGPT was used for the basics, giving Emily 35 years, a degree in marketing and digital media and a PhD in AI and machine learning, as well an English-American origin.

– To create her appearance, we used the Midjourney tool. From Emily, who was blonde, we got to a brunette, so as to adapt her to Marijana. All in all, we needed an hour to get to the final look. The photograph made that way was used in announcements and communication materials – explained Blecic.

A big challenge, he says, was how to calibrate Marijana’s pronunciation of English. That is why one of the newer tools, elevenlabs.io, was used to generate the voice. The video made that way was then put into the Face Fusion app, where Marijana’s appearance was replaced with the generated Dr. Emily. To synchronize the lip movements and adjust the pronunciation to match the tone of voice, synclabs.so was used. It was then all put together in Adobe After Effects, where the background was replaced and effects were added, and finally edited in Adobe Premiere Pro.

Although Dr. Emily Roberts is fake, everything she said is true, notes Blecic.

– Before shooting, we did the fact check and everything that ChatGPT wrote and Dr. Emily Roberts said are checked facts – Blecic pointed out and added that, if you want to create an avatar to speak instead of you, there’s an easier way: – At heygen.com, you can transfer yourself into a digital form very easily. Shoot a five-minute video, put in the text afterwards and you get a video of a person who talks and moves like you. We chose a more difficult way, because we didn’t want to violate any copyright or any other rights by creating Dr. Emily’s video and that’s why we used so many tools.

However, if you want to send your avatar to a conference that’s held in an EU member state, you will have to emphasize that. Because, according to the just adopted Law on Artificial Intelligence in the EU, AI-generated content has to be designated as such.

M. D.

RNIDS Beograd

Serbian National Internet Domain Foundation

RNIDS

Marijana Borković

Dane Blačić

Dr Emily Roberts

Serbian National Internet Domain Days

Midjourney

Face fusion

ChatGPT

elevenlabs

synclabs

Adobe Premiere Pro

Adobe After Effects

heygen

artificial intelligence

digital ethics

cyber harassment

deepfake

copyright

Law on Artificial Intelligence