I Feel Really Hurt: Rashmika Mandanna on Deepfake Video

A deepfake video of actor Rashmika Mandanna has been doing the rounds on social media. On Monday, Rashmika reacted to it and said that people needed to address this as a community since ‘technology is being misused’. The actor thanked her family, friends and well wishers, but admitted ‘the deepfake video of her being spread online was extremely scary’. She wrote on X (formerly Twitter), “I feel really hurt to share this and have to talk about the deepfake video of me being spread online. Something like this is honestly, extremely scary not only for me, but also for each one of us who today is vulnerable to so much harm because of how technology is being misused.” The viral video shows a British-Indian woman dressed in black inside an elevator with her face being edited using artificial intelligence (AI) to resemble Rashmika. The actor continued, “Today, as a woman and as an actor, I am thankful for my family, friends and well wishers who are my protection and support system. But if this happened to me when I was in school or college, I genuinely can’t imagine how could I ever tackle this. We need to address this as a community and with urgency before more of us are affected by such identity theft.” Rashmika tagged the official X accounts of Cyberabad Police and Maharashtra Cyber, nodal agency for cyber security and cybercrime investigation for Maharashtra, in her tweet. “We stand with you in this!!! Let’s raise awareness and work together to combat such misuse of technology. You’re not alone in this and we support you,” wrote a person on X. Another said, “This video is still okay, but there are worse. It is better to take action now than later.” A person also wrote, “It’s disheartening to see the harm caused by deepfake videos. Let’s work together to raise awareness about the consequences of technology misuse and protect one another online.” Earlier, Rashmika’s Goodbye co-star Amitabh Bachchan had called for action after her deepfake video began circulating. Amitabh took to X to re-share a tweet by a user calling for the ‘urgent need for a legal and regulatory framework to deal with deepfake in India’ amid Rashmika’s fake clip going viral. Reacting to the tweet, the veteran actor shared the video and wrote, “Yes, this is a strong case for legal.” The person in the video is a British woman named Zara Patel. She has a huge social media following and had uploaded the video last month. Sharing details, X user named Abhishek had tweeted, “There is an urgent need for a legal and regulatory framework to deal with deepfake in India. You might have seen this viral video of actress Rashmika Mandanna on Instagram. But wait, this is a deepfake video of Zara Patel. This thread contains the actual video.”

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