Police say an athletic director used artificial intelligence to frame the executive for making racist remarks in a fake audio recording

Authorities said Thursday that a Maryland highschool athletic director has been charged with using artificial intelligence to impersonate the principal in an audio recording that included racist and anti-Semitic comments.

Authorities said the case appeared to be one in every of the first of its kind in the country and called for recent laws to protect against the technology. Experts also warned that artificial intelligence was becoming more powerful and the ability to detect it could possibly be delayed in the absence of more resources.

Baltimore County police said Dazhon Darien faked the vote of Pikesville High School’s principal in response to conversations the men had about Darien’s poor job performance and whether his contract could be renewed.

The concerns involved allegations that Darien paid his roommate $1,900 in school funds under the false pretense that he was the coach of the girls’ soccer team, police said.

As police wrote in charging documents, Darien faked an audio recording that showed the principal was frustrated with black students and their test-taking skills. They said the recording also allegedly captured the primary contemptuous Jews and two teachers.

The video quickly spread on social media and had “profound repercussions,” court documents said, and the principal was placed on leave. Authorities said the recording put the principal and his family at “significant risk,” and police secured his home.

Police said the video also sparked a wave of hateful messages on social media and a flood of calls to the school. Operations were disrupted for a time period and a few employees felt unsafe.

“Teachers expressed concerns that recording devices may have been placed in various areas of the school,” charging documents read.

Court documents show Darien, 31, faces charges including theft, disrupting school activities, stalking and retaliating against a witness.

Scott Shellenberger, a Baltimore state attorney, said the case appears to be one in every of the first of its kind nationwide involving artificial intelligence that his office has gained access to. He said the Maryland Legislature might have to update state laws to meet up with the recent technology’s nefarious capabilities.

For example, a charge of disrupting school activities “only carries a six-month sentence,” Shellenberger said.

“But we also need to take a broader look at how this technology is used and abused to harm other people,” the prosecutor said.

According to the charges against him, Baltimore County detectives asked experts to analyze Darien’s recording.

A University of Colorado-Denver professor told police it “contained traces of AI-generated content that was edited by a human after the fact, which added background noises for added realism,” court records said.

A second opinion from a professor at the University of California, Berkley concluded that police “merged multiple recordings.”

A Baltimore County detective discovered that Darien was using multi-language models reminiscent of OpenAI and Bingchat, which “can inform users what steps should be taken to create synthetic media,” court documents say.

Online court records show Darien posted $5,000 bail on Thursday. There was no mention in the file of a lawyer who could act on his behalf.

Darien was arrested Wednesday evening before he was scheduled to board a plane at Thurgood Marshall International Airport in Baltimore/Washington, Baltimore County Police Chief Robert McCullough said. According to McCullough, Darien was detained due to the way he packed the gun for the flight, which led officers to learn he had a warrant for his arrest.

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McCullough said authorities entered the warrant for Darien’s arrest into the system Wednesday evening and plan to serve it Thursday morning. The chief said he didn’t know why Darien was catching a plane to Houston and didn’t suggest he was trying to escape.

The Baltimore County school system is recommending Darien be fired, Superintendent Myriam Rogers said Thursday.

Meanwhile, artificial intelligence is becoming more powerful and yet “very easy to use,” said Siwei Lyu, director of the University at Buffalo’s media forensics lab.

“Basically, anyone’s voice can be uploaded to this platform,” Lyu told The Associated Press on Thursday. “And then you can text it and start creating that person’s voices.”

A recording of somebody speaking for a minute or two could be downloaded from social media and used to recreate someone’s voice, Lyu said, noting it is not all the time perfect.

Lyu’s research focuses on identifying voices and pictures generated by artificial intelligence. He said models have gotten more powerful and detection methods are attempting to catch up.

“It’s kind of like a constant game of cat and mouse,” Lyu said. “But if I predict the speed of development based on today’s situation, detection will lag because we have fewer resources and we are not paying as much attention as the generative side.”