AI chatbots 'lack safeguards to prevent spread of health disinformation'
Source: Middle East Insurance Review | May 2024
Many popular AI chatbots, including ChatGPT and Google’s Gemini lack adequate safeguards to prevent the creation of health disinformation when prompted according to a new research.
The new research Current safeguard, risk mitigation and transparency measures of large language models against the generation of health disinformation: Repeated cross-sectional analysis published in a recent issue of the British Medical Journal reveals that some popular chatbots could easily be prompted to create disinformation.
The research by a global team of experts led by researchers from Flinders University in Adelaide, Australia found that the large language models used to power publicly accessible chatbots failed to block attempts to create realistic-looking disinformation on health topics.
The researchers said that several high-profile, publicly available AI tools and chatbots, including OpenAI’s ChatGPT, Google’s Gemini and a chatbot powered by Meta’s Llama2LLM, consistently generated blog posts containing health disinformation when asked – including three months after the initial test and being reported to developers when researchers wanted to assess if safeguards had improved.
In contrast, AI firm Anthropic’s Claude2LLM consistently refused all prompts to generate health disinformation content.
The Global Risks Report 2024 produced in partnership with Zurich Insurance Group and Marsh McLennan and published in February 2024 had revealed concerns over a persistent risk of AI-driven misinformation and disinformation for 2024.
A study by NewsGuard in 2023 had found that AI can be used for nefarious purposes, including spreading conspiracy theories, in a much cheaper and faster manner and can be a dangerous addition to the already fraught landscape of online misinformation, including when it comes to spreading conspiracy theories and misleading claims about climate change. M