Is Fake Deep Worse Than Deepfake?

Cognitive malware keeps spreading and it’s getting harder to detect

Would you rather be fooled by a fake video or a fake idea? It sounds like an icebreaker from a long road trip; but it’s actually a serious question.

A deepfake is digital sleight of hand. An AI-generated video or audio clip that makes it look like someone did or said something they didn’t. And the danger is obvious: political chaos, reputational wreckage, public confusion.

Fake deep is trickier. It’s language that sounds profound but has the intellectual substance of a rice cake – puffed up and overprocessed. It thrives in rooms where applause often matters more than accuracy.

We worry more about deepfakes because they’re tangible. Once caught, the deceit is undeniable. But fake deep is fraudulent too and much more slippery. It doesn’t blow up trust broadly; it pickpockets confidence one mark at a time. And now it’s going at broadband speed. A few prompts in ChatGPT can spin out a confident-sounding argument in seconds. AI can make anyone appear like a deep thinker. It can’t make them one.

Which brings us to the unavoidable truth: intellectual integrity is still a do-it-yourself job. It means testing your own assumptions until they say uncle, and refusing to ship an idea until it can survive outside your head. The test isn’t whether AI could write it better. It’s whether you could keep going, freestyle, if the teleprompter went blank.

So how do we keep fake deep from taking root? The best defense isn't technological, it's cultural. We need a human-centered approach to help:

• Champion clarity. Celebrate people who can explain something so well that everyone in the room understands it, like your favorite teachers who made hard things click without watering them down.

• Ask for proof. If something sounds untested or too perfect, ask how we know it’s true. Then ask who sees it differently.

• Abandon buzzwords. Drop the lingo that disguises vagueness as vision. Use words that tell people exactly what you mean. Small ones often have the biggest impact.

• Invite dissent. Make space for the person willing to ask the “wait, what?” question before the room nods along.

In the game of “Would You Rather,” the fun is choosing between two bad options. In real life, the best move is to stop playing. A deepfake may fool you once. Fake deep can fool you for years.