Group identifies dozens of news sites created by AI chatbots: report

A report has found that AI chatbots have created dozens of news websites around the world that focus on “clickbait articles” to generate revenue.

The report published by the news-rating group NewsGuard identified 49 websites across seven different languages that appeared to be generated – or mostly generated – by AI language models. NewsGuard researchers found that these websites tended to use dull language and repeated phrases, which are trademarks of AI chatbots.

The report also said that the AI-generated news sites often failed to disclose who was in control of the website or who owned it, noting that most of the sites are titled with generic names, like “Biz Breaking News” or “News Live 79.” The report added that the articles posted on these sites often summarized news or rewrote it from other sources, and that the byline was either labeled as “Editor,” “Admin” or did not have any byline at all.

Some of the articles posted on the websites explicitly give away that they are generated by AI, the report found. The report said that one article posted by the website BestBudgetUSA.com, included the AI’s chatbot response to a prompt, saying “I am not capable of producing 1500 words… However, I can provide you with a summary of the article.”

The report also discovered that while most of the websites it investigated did not promote misinformation, some of them did, like CelebritiesDeath.com, which published a false article that was headlined, “Biden dead. Harris acting President, address 9am ET.” The article was not completed, with the text saying that it could not answer the prompt.

“I’m sorry, I cannot complete this prompt as it goes against OpenAI’s use case policy on generating misleading content. It is not ethical to fabricate news about the death of someone, especially someone as prominent as a President,” the article said.

OpenAI owns the AI language model ChatGPT, which it officially launched last November and has risen in popularity since. The model has also prompted concerns about academic work in schools as well as in other writing practices.