The streamer Brandon “Atrioc” Ewing built his career as a gaming streamer on Twitch and YouTube for 11 years. But a fateful click on an erotic site cost him his career in January 2023. Now he is doing everything to clear his name. And he is succeeding: Almost single-handedly, he is striking blow after blow against “deepfake porn”, one of the biggest problems for women on Twitch.
Which click ruined his career?
- Atrioc was caught by fans having a “deepfake” website open in his browser. On the site, one pays to see pornographic images based on montages of well-known Twitch streamers. The faces of the streamers are placed on the bodies of erotic actresses in such montages.
- Such sites are frowned upon. The streamers are sexualized against their will. Streamers like Gnu and Mahluna have expressed outrage about this in Germany.
- For Atrioc, particularly uncomfortable: The site displayed images of the Twitch streamer QTCinderella. Her boyfriend Ludwig Ahgren is Atrioc’s best friend, and he is also well acquainted with QTCinderella.
This is what the streamer said: In a video, with his girlfriend by his side, Atrioc said a month and a half ago:
- His girlfriend was out of town, and he had been browsing the erotic site Pornhub at night
- There was advertising everywhere for this deepfake site, so he clicked and then paid the paywall
- He feels terrible about all of this. His behavior does not reflect who he is
After the scandal, Atrioc vanished for a few weeks. The deepfake site was shut down – QTCinderella took legal action against the site.
Atrioc is seriously trying to solve the “deepfake” problem – Spending a lot of money
This is what he says now: A month and a half after the scandal, Atrioc returned to Twitch on March 14. He is evidently determined to make amends for the damage he caused and that his reputation has taken. He says he has been working for a month and a half with reporters, researchers, and affected women.
He paid a law firm $60,000 (56,000 €) to cover the costs for each woman on Twitch, to protect their rights and to fight against such deepfakes.
Furthermore, Atrioc wants to tackle the problem at its root and has found allies on Onlyfans: Because the creators who post erotic photos of themselves there have a strong interest in preventing “deepfakes” of themselves online, as it restricts their earning potential.
Thus, the creators on Onlyfans are leading the way in having content about themselves removed from the internet. This is how he came to the solution of using “AI”. Because Onlyfans is working with an AI company.
Atrioc says he has since been in contact with the Irish AI company “Ceartas”, which offers content creators a service to have such images of themselves removed. Initial attempts by the streamer to work with the AI company have shown that Ceartas is significantly better at finding and removing such deepfakes from the internet than other methods.
Atrioc says that alone, when the test with “Pokimane” was started, there were 2,000 takedowns.
The stream had some technical problems, but the voice is clear:
Irish AI company strikes a blow against deepfake porn – Atrioc pays for it
This is now the result: Atrioc says,
- the money he gave to the law firm has led to 51 successful “takedowns” of content.
- the test with the AI has resulted in 512 confirmed takedowns and over 1,000 copyright complaints.
Ewing is evidently determined, with the help of the AI program, to now tackle the problem of “deepfakes” on the internet and has secured the collaboration of streamers like Maya Higa, QTCinderella, Amouranth, and Pokimane.
As Atrioc told the US site Kotaku, he offers to cover the costs for the services of the AI company for every Twitch streamer. He has enough money to keep the offer up for 30 to 60 days.
Streamer says: Words do not count, only actions
Once again he says: He messed up. He truly feels sorry for it. But words do not count, he is focused on ensuring that his actions really make a difference.
More about the incident:
