WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. (WISH) — Former President Trump in a straitjacket and Vice President Kamala Harris portrayed as a communist: These are just two instances of deepfakes circulating around the internet ahead of election day.

The spread of deepfakes and disinformation is increasing as the nation inches closer to Nov. 5.

Purdue University Professor Daniel Schiff has been tracking these trends online. Schiff says he has successfully identified 635 instances of deepfakes targeting the election.

That number that continues to grow by the day.

Most deepfakes are being posted by accounts not associated with either campaign, according to Schiff.

“They could be foreign actors. They could be domestic actors. They could be domestic actors paid by foreign actors, it may not be just the average Joe,” he said.

Schiff says the campaigns are even getting in on the action of posting or reposting deepfakes.

“We’ve seen something of an uptick actually in sharing by political campaigns,” said Schiff.

What the campaigns and other public figures are sharing can be considered satire, but Schiff says they’re falling into a murky gray area between free speech and purposeful misinformation.

“Some of these kind of cross lines, blur lines, between what is comedy and satire and criticism and what is misinformation,” he said.

Then, there are images created by artificial intelligence showing President Biden pointing at a board with the words “Operation Steal Philadelphia.”

“It’s not a low quality production here. It’s something that someone could quite plausibly believe,” said Schiff.

The “Operation Steal Philadelphia” image is something Schiff is most concerned about, and videos like the one made by Russia, which shows someone tearing up ballots with Trump votes on them.

Schiff says the disinformation and deepfakes could persist well after election day. “There are very good reasons to be concerned about this lingering after the election,” he concluded.

After the election, Schiff says he will start researching to see if all of these deepfakes and misinformation had an impact on the outcome of the election.