Bi-Level Optimization for Self-Supervised AI-Generated Face Detection

Fuente: arXiv
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Main Authors: Zou, Mian, Zhong, Nan, Yu, Baosheng, Zhan, Yibing, Ma, Kede
Format: Preprint
Published: 2025
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author Zou, Mian
Zhong, Nan
Yu, Baosheng
Zhan, Yibing
Ma, Kede
author_facet Zou, Mian
Zhong, Nan
Yu, Baosheng
Zhan, Yibing
Ma, Kede
contents AI-generated face detectors trained via supervised learning typically rely on synthesized images from specific generators, limiting their generalization to emerging generative techniques. To overcome this limitation, we introduce a self-supervised method based on bi-level optimization. In the inner loop, we pretrain a vision encoder only on photographic face images using a set of linearly weighted pretext tasks: classification of categorical exchangeable image file format (EXIF) tags, ranking of ordinal EXIF tags, and detection of artificial face manipulations. The outer loop then optimizes the relative weights of these pretext tasks to enhance the coarse-grained detection of manipulated faces, serving as a proxy task for identifying AI-generated faces. In doing so, it aligns self-supervised learning more closely with the ultimate goal of AI-generated face detection. Once pretrained, the encoder remains fixed, and AI-generated faces are detected either as anomalies under a Gaussian mixture model fitted to photographic face features or by a lightweight two-layer perceptron serving as a binary classifier. Extensive experiments demonstrate that our detectors significantly outperform existing approaches in both one-class and binary classification settings, exhibiting strong generalization to unseen generators.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2507_22824
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Bi-Level Optimization for Self-Supervised AI-Generated Face Detection
Zou, Mian
Zhong, Nan
Yu, Baosheng
Zhan, Yibing
Ma, Kede
Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition
AI-generated face detectors trained via supervised learning typically rely on synthesized images from specific generators, limiting their generalization to emerging generative techniques. To overcome this limitation, we introduce a self-supervised method based on bi-level optimization. In the inner loop, we pretrain a vision encoder only on photographic face images using a set of linearly weighted pretext tasks: classification of categorical exchangeable image file format (EXIF) tags, ranking of ordinal EXIF tags, and detection of artificial face manipulations. The outer loop then optimizes the relative weights of these pretext tasks to enhance the coarse-grained detection of manipulated faces, serving as a proxy task for identifying AI-generated faces. In doing so, it aligns self-supervised learning more closely with the ultimate goal of AI-generated face detection. Once pretrained, the encoder remains fixed, and AI-generated faces are detected either as anomalies under a Gaussian mixture model fitted to photographic face features or by a lightweight two-layer perceptron serving as a binary classifier. Extensive experiments demonstrate that our detectors significantly outperform existing approaches in both one-class and binary classification settings, exhibiting strong generalization to unseen generators.
title Bi-Level Optimization for Self-Supervised AI-Generated Face Detection
topic Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2507.22824