ChatGPT: China detains man for allegedly generating fake train crash news, first known time person held over use of AI bot

Name: Baidu unveils China’s answer to ChatGPT, sends stocks tumbling
Uploaded: 2023-05-08T10:00:20.000Z
Duration: 2 min 27 s
Description: Baidu unveils China’s answer to ChatGPT, sends stocks tumbling

Police in Gansu say suspect named Hong used artificial intelligence technology to concoct information and post it on multiple accounts

Chinese regulations that took effect in January require videos and photos made using deep synthesis tech to be clearly labelled to prevent public confusion

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A man has been arrested in Gansu province in China after allegedly using AI to create “false and untrue information”. Photo: Shutterstock

William Zheng

Published: 6:00pm, 8 May 2023Updated: 7:33pm, 8 May 2023

Chinese police have detained a man who allegedly used ChatGPT to generate fake news and disseminate it online in what may be the country’s first detention related to use of the bot.

Police in northwestern China’s Gansu province said in a statement on Sunday that a suspect surnamed Hong had been detained for “using artificial intelligence technology to concoct false and untrue information”.

The case first caught the attention of the cyber division of a county police bureau when they spotted a fake news article that claimed nine people had been killed in a local train accident on April 25.

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The cybersecurity officers in Kongtong county found the article simultaneously posted by more than 20 accounts on Baijiahao, a blog-style platform run by Chinese search engine giant Baidu. The stories had received more than 15,000 clicks by the time it came to authorities’ attention.

This is the first time the public has been made aware of a detention by Chinese authorities after Beijing’s first provisions to regulate the use of “deepfake” technology officially took effect in January.

The provisions, called the Administrative Provisions on Deep Synthesis for Internet Information Service, define deep synthesis as the use of technologies – including deep learning and augmented reality – to generate text, images, audio and video and to create virtual scenarios.

The police said they traced the origins of the article to a company owned by the suspect Hong, which operated personal media platforms registered in Shenzhen in Guangdong province in southern China. Some 10 days later a police team searched Hong’s home and his computer and detained him.

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