Former professional golfer Pak Se-ri and actor Kim Seung-soo's wedding announcement video fooled millions. The video was confirmed to be false content produced by artificial intelligence (AI).
A video that recently spread mainly on YouTube and social media depicted the two developing a romantic relationship after appearing on a variety show and claimed that SBS News officially announced their marriage. The video was staged to look factual by even including concrete circumstances such as "on Jan. 23 in a private location in Seoul, they will hold a private wedding with only family and acquaintances invited."
The video was produced by closely imitating the subtitle layout, commentary, and screen transitions of an actual news broadcast. Because of this, some viewers accepted the content as true, and comments continued with responses such as "congratulations" and "they look good together."
The problematic video was later copied and redistributed across multiple platforms and spread, with some videos exceeding 8.7 million views. False information spread quickly as reactions treating the two people's marriage as a fait accompli emerged.
But this was a fake video completely unrelated to reality. It was a typical AI-generated false piece that synthesized the real persons' images and voices and pieced together existing news screens and article formats. The production purpose was reported to be securing views and advertising revenue.
Low-quality AI-generated material that packages false information like news and distributes it in this way is called "AI Slop." Slop originally means food scraps or filth, and in the social media environment it refers to false content that adds sensational settings to induce clicks.
In particular, topics that attract strong public interest such as marriage, divorce, and death are repeatedly used, and when a celebrity's image is exploited, credibility rapidly increases. Experts point out that the more actual news formats are borrowed, the harder it becomes for users to distinguish truth from falsehood.
According to analysis by U.S. video editing platform Kapwing, Korea was identified as the largest consumer country of AI Slop content. Cumulative views of Korea-based AI Slop channels reached about 8.4 billion, far surpassing Pakistan (5.3 billion) and the United States (3.4 billion).
As the structure in which false information is consumed like real news becomes entrenched, calls are growing for stronger responses such as platform-level sanctions and blocking advertising revenue.
[Photo] OSEN DB
[OSEN]