Senator Raffy T. Tulfo has urged the Cybercrime Investigation and Coordinating Center (CICC) to capacitate itself in addressing the rise in deep fakes and disinformation especially in the runup to the mid-term elections.
At the Senate Finance Subcommittee on the 2025 proposed budget of the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT), Tulfo expressed alarm over the use of artificial intelligence featuring government officials and personalities has misled the public.
“I’m really concerned with the use of AI to spread fake news. The face of a person, even opening the mouth, speaking, it’s like it’s real, it’s like it’s true and all. And it’s increasing,” the Senator said.
Tulfo was concerned that people might do something or believe something because AI generated videos use real people. “ They’re telling people to do something or expose something when, in fact, that something is fake news. And a lot of people will believe it because the faces of the people are rea,” he explained.
CICC Executive Director Alexander K. Ramos has been enhancing the digital forensics and cybersecurity capabilities of the agency by developing new tools in partnership with the De La Salle – College of Saint Benilde (DLC-CSB), and funded by the Department of Science and Technology – Philippine Council for Industry, Energy and Emerging Technology Research and Development (DOST-PCIEERD).
“As far as what we are doing at present, because the lack of regulation on AI here in the country, we are adopting certain standards on identifying what is real and what is not,” he said.
Ramos informed the committee that the tools being developed are focused on cryptocurrency, ransomware and AI.
“All crimes are related utilizing any of these three major tools. That’s why, we are actually developing a field of expertise in these by continuous training,” he explained.
CICC has also launched since August this year a training program for CICC personnel and our partner agencies to enhance their digital forensic and cybersecurity capabilities.
CICC has proposed an annual budget of P487 million for 2025, up by a2.6 percent increase of its budget for 2025. The flagship projects to be funded next year are the National Cybercrime Hub (NCH), the InterAgency Response Center and the Project ACUITY which is the cybercrime awareness and education program of the agency.
Issued by the Office of Executive Director Alexander K. Ramos
