ChatGPT: China detains man for allegedly generating fake train crash news, first known time person held over use of AI bot
- 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
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.
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 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.
The statement said Hong confessed to bypassing Baijiahao’s duplication check function to publish on multiple accounts he had acquired. He input the elements of trending social stories in China from past years into ChatGPT to quickly produce different versions of the same fake story and uploaded them to his Baijiahao accounts, it said.
While ChatGPT is not directly available to Chinese IP addresses, Chinese users can still access its service if they have a reliable VPN connection.
In 2013, the Chinese authorities extended it to cover people deemed to have posted and spread false news or rumours online.
China’s top internet regulator has long voiced concern that unchecked development and use of deep synthesis technology could lead to its use in criminal activities such as online scams or defamation.
China’s regulations, which were jointly introduced by the Cyberspace Administration of China, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and the Ministry of Public Security, say videos and photos made using deep synthesis technology must be “clearly labelled” to prevent public confusion.
Previously, the regulation of deep synthesis was spread between multiple authorities, but the move to implement a stand-alone regulation shows China wants to rein in the rapid development of the technology and the regulatory challenges it faces.
Western social media platforms such as Twitter and Facebook have also introduced measures to detect and prevent the spread of disinformation generated by deepfake technology.
As ChatGPT has gone viral in recent months, China’s law enforcement agencies have repeatedly voiced suspicion, and even warnings, about the technology.