On-Device Watermarking: A Socio-Technical Imperative For Authenticity In The Age of Generative AI

As generative AI models produce increasingly realistic output, both academia and industry are focusing on the ability to detect whether an output was generated by an AI model or not. Many of the research efforts and policy discourse are centered around robust watermarking of AI outputs. While plenty of progress has been made, all watermarking and AI detection techniques face severe limitations. In this position paper, we argue that we are adopting the wrong approach, and should instead focus on watermarking via cryptographic signatures trustworthy content rather than AI generated ones. For audio-visual content, in particular, all real content is grounded in the physical world and captured via hardware sensors. This presents a unique opportunity to watermark at the hardware layer, and we lay out a socio-technical framework and draw parallels with HTTPS certification and Blu-Ray verification protocols. While acknowledging implementation challenges, we contend that hardware-based authentication offers a more tractable path forward, particularly from a policy perspective. As generative models approach perceptual indistinguishability, the research community should be wary of being overly optimistic with AI watermarking, and we argue that AI watermarking research efforts are better spent in the text and LLM space, which are ultimately not traceable to a physical sensor.