Blockchain on Trial: Digital Provenance and the Deepfake Defense

Abstract

Courts are meant to be where facts are established through evidence; troublingly, however, that ideal is growing harder to sustain as artificial intelligence erodes the long-standing truism that seeing is believing. Accordingly, scholars have increasingly turned to blockchain-based provenance technology as a definitive solution, presenting it as a definitive cryptographic solution for distinguishing between the real and the (deep)fake. This thesis contends, however, that the implementation of a secure digital ledger does not, by itself, solve the courts’ crisis of authentication. Rather, such technology is fundamentally limited by a neglected variable: juror psychology. Conducting a mock jury trial, “Blockchain on Trial: Digital Provenance and the Deepfake Defense” demonstrates that while a blockchain can secure a chain of custody, it cannot account for the cognitive biases of a modern jury. Jurors, conditioned by popular media to expect hyper-clear forensic certainty, may perceive a secure digital ledger as an infallible "black box," leading to a dangerous displacement of critical context. It provides an interpretive framework for the judiciary, arguing that without a fundamental reform of evidentiary standards and a redirection of jury instructions, the tools of provenance will remain an insufficient defense against the deepfake era.