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AI incident #1087 ·

Campaign Featuring Purported AI-Generated Audio Attributed to Omar al-Bashir Spreads During Sudanese Conflict

Open on the AI Incident Database 3 news reports Snapshot 7 Sep 2026

What happened

Beginning in late August 2023, a TikTok channel called The Voice of Sudan circulated purported AI-generated audio claiming to be leaked recordings of former Sudanese president Omar al-Bashir. Experts identified several recordings as voice-cloned fabrications, derived from unrelated broadcasts by a political commentator. The campaign emerged during Sudan's civil war and appeared designed to influence political perceptions. TikTok later removed the account for violating synthetic media policies.

Only the incident metadata is stored here. The underlying news reports are on the AI Incident Database (CC BY-SA 4.0); use the links above to read them.

News reports (3)

Coverage catalogued by the AI Incident Database. Titles link to the original publisher; the text is not reproduced here.

  1. AI: Voice cloning tech emerges in Sudan civil war
    bbc.com · Jack Goodman, Mohanad Hashim · AIID #5277
  2. AI-driven impersonation campaign of Sudan’s ex-leader goes viral on TikTok
    dig.watch · Digital Watch observatory · AIID #5278
  3. The Deepfake is a powerful weapon in the war in Sudan
    africanarguments.org · Mohamed Suliman · AIID #5282

Who was involved

Alleged deployer
The Voice Of Sudan
Alleged harmed party
Omar Al Bashir, General Public Of Sudan, General Public, Epistemic Integrity, National Security And Intelligence Stakeholders

Classification (MIT AI Risk Repository taxonomy)

Causal entity
Human
Intent
Intentional
Timing
Post-deployment
Harm level
—
Sectors
—
Countries
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Risk entries describing this failure mode

Entries from the MIT AI Risk Repository coded to subdomain 4.1.

  • Coercion/manipulation

    "Coercion/manipulation - Use of a technology system to covertly alter user beliefs and behaviour using nudging, dark patterns and/or other opaque techniques, resulting in potential erosion of privacy, addiction, anxiety/...

    A Collaborative, Human-Centred Taxonomy of AI, Algorithmic, and Automation Harms (Abercrombie2024)

  • Electoral interference

    "Electoral interference - Generation of false or misleading information that can interrupt or mislead voters and/or undermine trust in electoral processes."

    A Collaborative, Human-Centred Taxonomy of AI, Algorithmic, and Automation Harms (Abercrombie2024)

  • Political manipulation

    "Political manipulation - Use or misuse of personal data to target individuals’ interests, personalities and vulnerabilities with tailored political messages via micro-advertising or deepfakes/synthetic media."

    A Collaborative, Human-Centred Taxonomy of AI, Algorithmic, and Automation Harms (Abercrombie2024)

  • Political and Economic

    "Political and Economic - Manipulation of political beliefs, damage to political institutions and the effective delivery of government services."

    A Collaborative, Human-Centred Taxonomy of AI, Algorithmic, and Automation Harms (Abercrombie2024)

  • Biased influence through citizen screening and tailored propaganda

    "AI-powered chatbots tailor their communication approach to influence individual users' decisions. In the UK, a form of initial computational propaganda has already happened during the Brexit referendum. In future, there...

    The Rise of Artificial Intelligence - Future Outlooks and Emerging Risks (Allianz2018)

  • Political

    "In the UK, a form of initial computational propaganda has already happened during the Brexit referendum1 . In future, there are concerns that oppressive governments could use AI to shape citizens’ opinions"

    The Rise of Artificial Intelligence - Future Outlooks and Emerging Risks (Allianz2018)

  • Surveillance and Censorship

    "Content moderation has emerged as one of the key use-cases of LLMs (Weng et al., 2023), indicating the potential of LLMs for surveillance and censorship as well (Edwards, 2023). Surveillance and censorship are one of th...

    Foundational Challenges in Assuring Alignment and Safety of Large Language Models (Anwar2024)

  • Disinformation and manipulation of public opinion

    "AI, particularly general- purpose AI, can be maliciously used for disinformation (351), which for the purpose of this report refers to false information that was generated or spread with the deliberate intent to mislead...

    International Scientific Report on the Safety of Advanced AI (Bengio2024)

Incidents in the same risk subdomain

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