(I do not think it was AI.)
But you are correct, if it was in fact AI, showing how he (or someone else) made it at the time would certainly help get him off the hook.
Guy could've probably picked a better place to base jump anyway, national parks are notorious for having a billion laws that don't really exist anywhere else.
You can't even take your cat white river rafting on the grand canyon >:( https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/36/7.4
What are the chances that rule came about because of a dead/lost pet or because of some wildlife that was eaten? I'm 50/50 it was either.
I've done Grand Canyon whitewater (part in an OC1, part in a raft). A law against animal cruelty isn't a bad thing.
The article mentions evidence placing them at the scene of the crime, wearing a matching outfit, and they can probably find witnesses.
(Yeah, me neither.)
I wish there were more places to legally enjoy BASE jumping on US public lands.
There's far more to see outside of those national parks and forests than there is inside. Look up any paragliders or bush pilots on YouTube that live near federal land, and they pretty much go wherever they want to go.
If you're an avid hiker or camper and are visiting the US, find local documentation on where to visit or befriend someone in the area who can make recommendations, and you'll get to see our natural landscape without all of the tourists or regulations. You can legally BASE jump off a cliff, hike in the nude, mine for gold, set up an impromptu gun range, and camp there for a couple of weeks, or indefinitely if you hike two miles each day.
I am not a base jumper (I am a rock climber), but it's my observation that many base mountains with faces steep enough for base jumping are also in the parks and therefor restricted to base jumping.
Or are so remote they require some serious skills to summit in the first place. -- Not quite the tram ride you can get to the jump point in Europe.
Isn't lying to a federal investigator also a crime? Searching suggests 18 U.S.C. § 1001.
SCOTUS ruled very strictly on this in 1998. James Brogan was visited by Federal agents at his home and asked if he had accepted illegal cash payments from a company. Brogan simply answered "No."
SCOTUS upheld his conviction for this under U.S.C. § 1001. His only legal options were to say “Yes” or state his choice to exercise his 5th amendment right to remain silent.
Similar laws apply to interactions with pretty much any LEO in any US state, though the lie must be material to a criminal investigation. Note that some states make nearly everything a misdemeanor crime (like speeding 5mph over the limit) whereas other states make many of those things civil infractions.
It depends on how much money you have.
Finding an original copy on a go-pro would likely be pretty compelling evidence but this (and the more scary politically centered questions like this) are why I wish we had a way to build a durable chain of custody into these technologies. It is infeasible from everything I've seen but it would be a big win for society.
Nah. People who do something like this can't help but brag. They'll incriminate themselves in seconds voluntarily.
Do you? Consider for a moment all the dissidents and protestors who would be ensnared by their own devices then, with no "it was all ai" defense available?
I don't think the lack of a durable chain of custody really provides any protection - that protection needs to come from a strong legal system and social contract to protect whistleblowers. If you're thinking of, as an example, an Iranian smuggling out protest footage, they're already taking an extreme risk and have a state using numerous tools to try and track them down - but the lack of a durable chain gives a wide area of authorities to cast doubt on the truth.
I think your question is interesting to ponder and I think there are arguments in both directions - but my mind keeps coming back to the tank man photo being smuggled out of China and how much more difficult it would be in the modern world for a single image to carry such weight.
"I extracted and added the noise profile to the AI generated video with a goPro to make it look legitimate"
And those people now have the power to put you in jail, by putting your camera's signature on illegal content.
You've also just made journalism 3 notches harder. Like documenting atrocities in, say, North Korea. Or for whistleblowers in your home steel mill run by a corporate slavedriver.
Oh. Also. Why are you choosing the camera side to put this on? Why not the AI side? Require watermarks and signatures for anything created in such a way…
…of course that has its own set of intractable problems.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Content_Authenticity_Initiativ...
You trying to start a union in your workplace? Expect video of you jacking off in public to leak online. Video of cop mercilessly beating a black guy? Inadmissible, could have been AI.
It will only get worse as video and audio generation get better and better.
If it was a brand new account, then it seems possible that it's a fake.
But if somebody also had to hack his account to make this video... I suppose it's not impossible but you'd really, really be pushing "reasonable doubt" to it's limits.
https://www.nps.gov/subjects/policy/upload/NPS_Guidance_Memo...
For similar reasons, suicide should not be criminalized. Yes I am serious.
Comparing the number of BASE jumpers (small thousands) and the number of hikers and climbers (millions) BASE jumpers just can't have the political influence for access.
Random note, Brendan Weinstein who posted here on occasion recently died BASE jumping: https://www.reddit.com/r/SkyDiving/comments/1q6n7v2/brendan_...
Although, it would be nice if we could give people a general “I understand the risk and won’t ask for help if it goes wrong” waiver for dangerous activities.
If the prosecution can prove it was legit, that's prison for sure.
Even public defenders don’t bother with their own expert witnesses, much less a guy representing himself.
"Those who are caught and cited in Yosemite face fines up to $5,000."
What an absolute moron, he turned a $5,000 fine (worst case) into two years of prison.
This flock stuff is b.a.d.
They'll need a flock cam on the summit if they want to push that any further.
