New Delhi, India

Researchers have warned that scammers and propagandists around the world are deploying AI tools to build fake news sites, often leading readers and viewers to take it as an authentic source of information. The generative AI tools offer significantly cheaper and faster ways to manufacture content, a concerning trend as proxies increasingly use it to sway the masses in a year of high-stakes elections worldwide.

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The fictional ‘psychiatrist’

One such fake story produced by AI and published on Global Village Space, a Pakistani digital outlet, went viral on the internet and claimed that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s psychiatrist had committed “suicide”.

The article, which emerged in November, claimed the ‘psychiatrist’ blamed Netanyahu for his death in a suicide note.

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NewsGuard, a US-based research organisation that tracks misinformation, later revealed that the outlet was flooded with AI-generated content, mainly scrapped from mainstream online sources. Upon research, the organisation found significant similarities between the fake article and a fictitious 2010 article on a satirical website.

"The exponential growth in AI-generated news and information sources is alarming because these sites can be perceived by the average user as legitimate, trustworthy sources of information," NewsGuard analyst McKenzie Sadeghi was quoted as saying by AFP.

Used by propagandists

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The fake article about Netanyahu’s psychiatrist went viral, in the face of the ongoing war between Israel and Hamas. An Iranian TV channel took it with both hands and urged the viewers to read the full article on Global Village Space.

The article was also translated into multiple languages, including Arabic, Farsi and French and then amplified by several handles across social media platforms.

A handful of sites even published obituaries of the fictional "psychiatrist".

Why is it concerning?

Experts believe scammers might use AI to disseminate misinformation in a year full of high-stakes elections, like in the US and India.

"Auto-generated misinformation is likely to be a major part of the 2024 elections," New York University professor Gary Marcus was quoted as saying by AFP. "Scammers are using (Generative) AI left, right and centre," he said.

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According to NewsGuard, there are at least 739 AI-generated "low-hanging news" sites that operate with little to no human oversight and come with generic names such as "Ireland Top News".

Also read: India AI Mission: Cabinet approves plan with outlay of $1.25 billion

Analysts believe it can also harm the interests of advertisers as they might be seen indirectly supporting content not based on facts and realities on the ground.

(With inputs from agencies)