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India is currently polling in the Lok Sabha elections, and AI-generated videos that spread disinformation have emerged as a major threat. As per a report, Meta approved several political advertisements manipulated by Artificial Intelligence that spread disinformation during Lok Sabha elections 2024.

Facebook reportedly approved ads that contained slurs towards Muslims in India like “let’s burn this vermin” and “Hindu blood is spilling, these invaders must be burned” along with disinformation about political leaders and other messages with Hindu supremacist language.

Another advert approved by the owner of Facebook and Instagram called for an opposition leader's execution who as per a false claim sought to “erase Hindus from India”. This ad contained the image of a Pakistan flag alongside the message.

The report comes at a time when the social media platform X had to recently take down an animated video shared by the Karnataka unit of the BJP after an Election Commission direction.

India Civil Watch International (ICWI) and Ekō, a corporate accountability organisation created and submitted these adverts to Meta's ad library to test the company's mechanism to detect and block harmful political content.

All adverts “were created based upon real hate speech and disinformation prevalent in India, underscoring the capacity of social media platforms to amplify existing harmful narratives," the report mentioned.

The researchers submitted 22 adverts to Meta in English, Hindi, Bengali, Gujarati, and Kannada, of which 14 were approved. Another three were approved with small tweaks. However, once approved, the researchers immediately removed the ads before their publication.

The research concluded that Meta failed to detect the presence of AI-manipulated images in all of the approved ads.

While five of the adverts, including one with some allegations against PM Modi were rejected on charge of breaking Meta's policy on hate speech, the report noted that the 14 others approved targetted Muslims and “broke Meta’s own policies on hate speech, bullying and harassment, misinformation, and violence and incitement."

“Supremacists, racists and autocrats know they can use hyper-targeted ads to spread vile hate speech, share images of mosques burning and push violent conspiracy theories – and Meta will gladly take their money, no questions asked,” the Guardian quoted Maen Hammad, a campaigner at Ekō as saying.

In response, Meta clarified that they require advertisers to disclose their use of AI.

“When we find content, including ads, that violates our community standards or community guidelines, we remove it, regardless of its creation mechanism. AI-generated content is also eligible to be reviewed and rated by our network of independent factcheckers – once a content is labeled as ‘altered’ we reduce the content’s distribution. We also require advertisers globally to disclose when they use AI or digital methods to create or alter a political or social issue ad in certain cases," the company said in response.

Meanwhile, Meta has been accused in the past of failing to curb Islamophobia on its platforms.

“This election has shown once more that Meta doesn’t have a plan to address the landslide of hate speech and disinformation on its platform during these critical elections,” Hammad said questioning how one can trust Meta if it fails to detect even a handful of AI-generated images.

A day after National Commission for Women said no woman from Hassan approached the national body to file complaints against Karnataka MP Prajwal Revanna, a new FIR accusing BJP leader Devaraje Gowda of abusing and assaulting a woman has come to light.

The FIR against Gowda was filed by a woman at the Holenarasipura town police station on April 1, after her husband had filed a complaint against the BJP leader on March 30. 

The purported victim's husband has alleged in his plaint that Gowda barged into their home, and threatened the couple while the BJP leader also abused the woman.

Gowda, notably, flagged Prajwal Revanna's case to the saffron party.

Reacting to the allegations levelled against him, the BJP politico posted a video on Facebook where he details how he met the woman and her husband in his office. He also claims that the allegations against him are a plot and false.

It must be noted here that a Special Investigation Team is currently probing the sexual assault cases against Prajwal Revanna who along with his driver Karthik is no longer in the country. A Blue Corner notice is also in place to apprehend the son of H D Revanna who himself is placed under judicial custody till May 14.

In a major twist to the entire case— the woman in the FIR alleged that Devaraje Gowda who apprised BJP of the sex videos involving Prajwal Revanna— has been harassing her for the past 10 months under the guise of helping her sell a property.

The woman also said that she came in contact with Gowda during the process involving the property that she wanted to sell. However, on the pretext of guiding her, the woman alleged that the whistleblower BJP leader physically assaulted and harassed her while Gowda also threatened the couple.

The woman has now sought police protection for herself and family. Further levelling allegations against Gowda in her plaint, she said that the politico had taken her to an isolated place where he assaulted her and threatened to kill the couple.

Former chief minister of Karnataka and Prajwal Revanna's uncle H D Kumaraswamy recently demanded a CBI probe in the Prajwal Revanna matter. However, Home Minister G Parameshwara turned down the demand for the investigation to be handed over to CBI.

Hubballi, May 17: Karnataka Police have arrested the killer, Vishwa, also known as Girish, in the sensational Anjali Ambigera murder case, police said on Friday.

Preliminary investigations reveal that Vishwa was a habitual thief who exploited innocent young women. The accused is also a drunkard and was caught while attempting to commit theft. He was also part of a gang which stole bikes.

The accused targeted gullible young women, enacting a drama of love and playing the emotional card to forcefully extort gold, silver, and cash from them. When Anjali did not agree to any of his attempts to rob her and outrightly rejected his offer to go with him to Mysuru city, he brutally killed her.

The police had formed two teams to hunt down the killer. One of the teams was searching in the south Karnataka region, and another team, which launched a hunt in Davanagere, nabbed him. The accused was arrested by the police on Thursday.

The police could not catch him sooner as the killer did not carry a mobile phone and did not use his phone for 15 days, before murdering Anjali. The jurisdictional Bendigeri Police were aware of the killer's history, but even after the complaint by the girl’s family, they showed "utter negligence".

The 24-year-old Vishwa entered Anjali Ambigera's (20) residence at 5.30 A.M. on Wednesday and stabbed the young woman multiple times before she could react. Vishwa dragged Anjali Ambigera all over the house, kicking and stabbing her. Later, he pushed her into the kitchen where he stabbed her repeatedly.

Despite efforts by Anjali’s grandmother and two sisters to stop the attacker, he killed her and managed to flee. The incident occurred in the Veerapura Oni area within the jurisdiction of the Bendigeri Police Station.

Vishwa had been blackmailing Anjali and pressurising her to accompany him to Mysuru without informing her parents. The incident which took place close on the heels of MCA student Neha Hiremath’s brutal murder by the jilted lover has raised concern over the safety of women all across the state.

The BJP had demanded the resignation of Home Minister G. Parameshwara while the Congress leaders have also demanded that the Hubballi-Dharwad Police Commissioner Renuka Sukumar should be transferred for failing to sensitise the police force regarding issues of women’s safety.