Survey Results: Shocking or Expected?

 After completing the survey assignment, I thought I'd take the chance to reflect on some of the shocking (and unshocking) results that came back. 

The first topic is extremely prevalent: scams, phishing, and catphishing. While a majority said they had never experienced this themselves, 100% of people shared that they know someone who has, AND that they think these are active problems today. I think as a society, we should be concerned that 100% of people know someone who has experienced this. 

The next topic is rather interesting: conspiracy theories. To sum it up, the most-believed conspiracy theory (72.7%) is that Jeffrey Epstein was murdered in prison to keep him from testifying. One person actually declared belief in no conspiracy theories. While I can't prove what is true and what isn't, conspiracy theories are always fascinating, and I definitely want to do further research on them after this course to form stronger opinions of my own. 

The next section really concerned me: deepfakes. 95.5% of people are concerned about the damage deepfakes can cause. That didn't shock me. What did surprise me, however, was that 81.8% of people believe they can detect an AI-generated deepfake. I thought, wow, people are confident. I then realized that before this course, I, too, would have believed I could detect one (until I failed every single deepfake detection in class). I think it is concerning that people don't realize how deceiving and realistic these videos are, and I hope that awareness grows to not believe everything you see. It scares me. 

The next question is a very relavent topic: ChatGPT. 13.6% said that they do not use AI, which I thought was very interesting. I am a big believer in not using AI as a substitute or to do the work for you, but rather as an efficiency tool. I once heard a quote that said, "Don't be afraid of AI taking your job, be afraid of people who know how to use it." 

Overall, these are some of the survey results that really stood out to me. I'm looking forward to analyzing the next bunch soon.