Deepfake: Threat or Opportunity? Creating Trustworthy Hyperreality in AI-Based Marketing-The Malaria Must Die Case

İlkay Ceren Sönmez

Abstract


Purpose: This research examines whether deepfake -commonly linked to deception or manipulation etc.- can be ethically reframed as a creative, emotionally persuasive tool in AI-based humanitarian marketing. Using the Malaria Must Die campaign as a case study, it analyzes how synthetic media can construct “credible hyperreality,” an aesthetic space where simulation supports authenticity, and how transparent deepfake use can convert technological risk into humanitarian opportunity.

Methodology: The research employs Multimodal Discourse Analysis (MDA) grounded in Kress and van Leeuwen’s social semiotic framework. The advertisement was segmented into sequences and analyzed across visual, linguistic, auditory, and cinematographic modes. Sub-modes (framing, salience, information value, gesture, soundtrack, color, deepfake transitions) were coded to reveal meaning-making patterns. The research interprets multimodal composition rather than measuring audience reception.

Results: Three primary narrative modes emerged: (1) ethical simulation, reframing deepfake as moral amplification; (2) polyphonic participation, realized through Beckham’s multilingual synthetic performance representing diverse voices; and (3) aesthetic realism, produced via warm palettes, intimate domestic settings, and intersemiotic coherence. Together these modes generate credible hyperreality-an emotionally authentic and ethically framed simulated narrative.

Originality: The research repositions deepfake from a manipulation paradigm toward responsible mediation that can produce emotional authenticity in humanitarian communication. By integrating Baudrillard’s hyperreality with multimodal analysis, it offers a novel theoretical lens on synthetic media and demonstrates how deepfake can ethically enhance empathy, solidarity, and global engagement.

Keywords: Deepfake; Multimodal Discourse Analysis; Hyperreality; AI-based Marketing; Humanitarian Communication; Ethical Simulation.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.58869/SPM/04


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References


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European Journal of Applied Business and Management

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