BBC Research & Development Collaborates With Sony

The BBC Research & Development Department and Sony are taking their collaboration aimed at addressing the growing concerns surrounding synthetic content and its impact on the trustworthiness of news-related content, one step further.

This is part of a broader initiative involving key industry players, under the Coalition for Content Provenance and Authenticity (C2PA) committee. The goal is to establish robust workflows for image and video provenance and digital signatures to ensure the authenticity of digital content.

In an era where digital lives are inundated with content from numerous sources, distinguishing between fact and fiction has become increasingly challenging. The rise of synthetic content, which includes manipulated images and videos generated by artificial intelligence, poses significant risks to the credibility of news and information. To combat this, the members of C2PA are leveraging their expertise and resources to develop and promote technologies that help verify the authenticity of digital content.

As part of the C2PA committee, BBC R&D and Sony are collaborating with other industry leaders to establish standards for digital provenance. These standards will enable users to verify the authenticity of content and make informed decisions about what they consume. The C2PA standards will be integrated into devices and platforms, allowing users to see the details of content creation and manipulation. Of note, Sony’s PXW-Z300 launched in July 2025, is the first camcorder (according to Sony research as of July 2025) to embed digital signatures into video files, supporting the C2PA standard for content authentication and addressing the growing need for verifiable content.

Together with the other members of the C2PA committee, BBC R&D and Sony are committed to educating the public about the risks of synthetic content and the importance of verifying digital provenance. Through informative campaigns and collaborations with other media organisations, they aim to empower users to critically evaluate the content they encounter online.

As one of the world's first use cases of testing the C2PA workflow with video content, and as part of the IBC Accelerator, the BBC and Sony have collaborated in creating a video demonstrating how users can verify the authenticity of video content using devices that support C2PA. By checking the content credentials, users can see whether a video was captured by a real camera, who published it, and if it has been manipulated.

Featuring BBC's AI correspondent Marc Cieslak, the demonstration also highlighted the potential of AI-generated content to deceive viewers. Using Runway's Aleph model, BBC R&D combined real footage with AI-generated backgrounds, showing how easily synthetic content can be created. However, with C2PA support, users can identify such manipulations and make informed decisions about the content they consume.

The collaboration between BBC R&D and Sony marks another significant step towards a future where digital content can be traced back to its original source, ensuring transparency and trustworthiness. As technology evolves, the BBC R&D and Sony will continue to work with industry partners to refine and promote the adoption of C2PA standards.