River Deepfake Videos Draw Attention, Concern

A sensationalized deepfake video claiming unexplained “water loss” in the Mississippi River has raised eyebrows, caused concern and led to inquiries.

The video is one of a series made by a YouTube video channel that calls itself QuakeLore, with headquarters listed in France. Its videos feature claims that pander to conspiracy thinking regarding alleged “mysteries,” some involving the Mississippi River. Some of the videos have been forwarded to Corps of Engineers officials, asking them for comment.

The videos feature eye-grabbing catch phrases such as “Impossible!” “Catastrophe Looms!”, “Collapsing,” “Shocking!”, etc., along with stated or implied claims that the Corps or other authorities are trying to suppress or cover up information. Snippets of B-roll videos of actual Corps conferences or events with real figures are used in some of them, along with pasted-in logos of legitimate news organizations to make viewers believe they are from real newscasts.

After being sent one of the Mississippi River videos, Susan Olson identified it as a deepfake. Olson is well known to Waterways Journal readers, and to the waterways industry, as the founder of Action Intel, which introduced BargeAI to barge operators. She holds six U.S. patents for leveraging sensor data to generate new intelligence in transportation and commodities markets. Her technical skill set spans software development, machine learning, signal analysis, image analysis and generative AI.

Deepfake ‘Tells’

“There were two or three signs that the voiceover [of the QuakeLore video] was AI,” Olson said. “For instance, the voice pronounced ‘Corps’ as ‘corpse.’ And there were a few weird sound blurs. The video made specific references to government programs that we could not find anywhere in existence. The names of the researchers at the universities did not match any of the professors at the institutions.”

In addition, Olson said, there were other “tells.”

“The video called out ‘University of Mississippi,’ which is colloquially referenced as Ole Miss,” Olson said.

Other “facts” alleged in the video could not be verified.

“The statement about reduction in catfish farming, for instance, could not be discovered with basic internet research,” Olson said. “In retrospect, I realized there were few/no interviews. The video appears to be constructed from existing clips and images. In several instances, the clips shown had little to do with the ideas being promoted. It was like a video of B-roll.”

The Deepfake Future Is Here

A January 16 article by Siwei Lyu, distinguished professor and Empire Innovation professor at the State University of New York’s Department of Computer Science and Engineering, identified 2025 as a breakout year for deepfakes. Each week of the second half of 2025, according to a music-industry source, at least one song by an AI-generated “singer” was on the Billboard Top 100.

Lyu wrote, “The volume of deepfakes has grown explosively: Cybersecurity firm DeepStrike estimates an increase from roughly 500,000 online deepfakes in 2023 to about 8 million in 2025, with annual growth nearing 900 percent. … [T]he situation is likely to get worse in 2026 as deepfakes become synthetic performers capable of reacting to people in real time.”

“Deepfakes are moving toward real-time synthesis that can produce videos that closely resemble the nuances of a human’s appearance, making it easier for them to evade detection systems,” Lyu wrote. “The frontier is shifting from static visual realism to temporal and behavioral coherence: models that generate live or near-live content rather than pre-rendered clips.”

There are companies that maintain AI-powered detection software that can detect deepfakes, and some of this software is available to consumers in some form. The company Deepware, which spun off from cybersecurity company Zemana in 2018 to focus on detecting and education about deepfakes, notes on its website, “It’s not realistic to expect social media users or the public, in general, to learn to identify deepfake videos. The solution must be provided by the social media platforms or responsible large organizations and corporations.”

‘We Don’t Lose Water’

Until those platforms act, the best protection against being targeted or disturbed by deepfakes is to stick to trusted, known sources. As with scams and fake offers that show up in an email inbox, sometimes the best “detection software” is common sense and ordinary caution. Any video that sounds too breathless or urgent should be questioned. Any video that promises to “reveal secrets” or things that “they don’t want you to know” is using a well-known trick of con artists.

In the case of the Mississippi River, the Corps of Engineers is a reliable first stop. Another trustworthy source is drought.gov, a collaboration between NOAA and the National Integrated Drought Information system, which is regularly updated. It contains a Mississippi River Basin Drought & Water Dashboard. Both sources offer multiple links to reputable data sources.

Joey Windham, chief of the Watershed Division of the Corps of Engineers’ Mississippi Valley Division, told The Waterways Journal, “We have a national network of stream gages in coordination with National Weather Service (NWS), United States Geological Survey (USGS), that allow us to track and manage flows on the river very closely.”

Windham noted that river systems go through natural dry and wet cycles.

“During the 1920s through 1940, we experienced a wet cycle,” Windham said. “This was followed by a relative dry period in the 1950s into 1970, with relative low amounts of flooding and increased sediment build up in parts of the river. In 1973, we experienced the largest flood since the 1940s.

“We know that wet and dry cycles are driven by such things as El Niño and La Niña currents [in the Pacific Ocean],” Windham continued. “After a very wet pattern from 2015 to 2020, we have been in a dry pattern the last several years.”

The Mississippi Valley Division began releasing a monthly comprehensive report in November. The latest one is titled “State of the River: January 2026.” The report contains a plethora of factual information about the river system and its cycles.