Potential risks in spreading misinformation
Science and technology not only affect the way the press and media convey their messages, influence and influence the way and effectiveness of public access, but also deeply impact the quality of information.
In fact, journalism has been able to adapt quickly to technological innovation, especially in recent years. Artificial Intelligence (AI) has gradually become popular in the mass media and in the newsrooms of news agencies. The application of AI has brought benefits to both journalists and media organizations. It frees journalists from tedious routine tasks, helping them save time and focus on more creative and high-skilled work.
While AI has many benefits, it also raises some concerns. One of the most significant risks is the potential for AI-generated content to spread misinformation.
The world's top 10 news agencies are calling for collective and transparent negotiations between media outlets and AI developers to control which copyrighted material can be used in training AI tools, as well as eliminate bias in AI algorithms.
This past week, 10 of the world’s leading news organizations signed a letter calling for transparency and clear copyright laws aimed at AI. The news organizations argued that AI has the potential to “threaten the sustainability of the media ecosystem” by significantly eroding readers’ trust in the quality and integrity of news.
According to many studies, AI can be used to filter and select stories that are most likely to attract readers and engage, thus creating an imbalance in the news that would not exist if stories were presented in an objective manner produced by humans. The public is only exposed to one side of the story, and therefore, they can be oriented by one-sided information generated by AI. Furthermore, AI can be used to spread misinformation and fake news to the public by presenting fabricated stories alongside real ones.
AI can also be fooled by fake news. AI algorithms are designed to process data quickly and accurately, which means it is difficult to distinguish between real and fake news. Furthermore, AI is incapable of understanding the emotional and moral implications of the news it processes. As AI continues to become more advanced, its vulnerability to fake news will increase, making it even more difficult to distinguish between what is real and what is fake.
According to Associate Professor Dr. Nguyen Ngoc Oanh - Head of the Department of International Relations, Academy of Journalism and Communication, when AI becomes powerful, it is also the time when we need to pay special attention and be proactive against the risk of bad guys and hostile forces using AI to spread harmful and fake news. From the perspective of media security, this shows the potential risk of misinformation, distortion, and fake news. Once artificial intelligence is applied in the information field, technology can help fake voices, images, create fake stories and statements that seem real to deceive the public, especially in social networking space.
"Those with bad intentions take advantage of the role and reputation of the press to falsify information, deceiving the public that the information provided and reflected by the press. The development of fake news will become more sophisticated and complex, and therefore, along with raising vigilance, methods of identifying, responding to, and handling fake news must focus on investing in smart technology and handling it systematically. The capacity of social management and press agency management needs to be improved to adapt to changes," Associate Professor, Dr. Nguyen Ngoc Oanh commented.
The news industry must find ways to protect its creative content.
Since the launch of ChatGPT in November 2022, new applications based on Generative AI have been deployed almost daily. As a result, the internet has become filled with AI-generated content. While there is some that is mind-blowing, there is also a lot of bland, repetitive content. This makes it easier to spread misinformation and puts a greater burden on the media industry to build and restore trust with its readers.
Journalist Nguyen Hoang Nhat - Deputy Editor-in-Chief of Vietnamplus Newspaper, recalled lessons from the past, when many experts said that one of the first big mistakes of the press was reacting too slowly to the importance and invasion of social networks. "We have gone through a long period of putting all the content we produce on social networks, changing our most core things to serve it, which is sometimes not our strength nor what readers need. In short, we have given too much power to social networks and led to social networks turning around and swallowing us," said journalist Nguyen Hoang Nhat.
During the days when the Vietnamese women's team competed at the World Cup, social media was filled with sources spreading distorted and fabricated information. (Photo: VTC)
Looking at the current threat from AI, journalist Nguyen Hoang Nhat said that, in general, AI helps newsrooms do their work faster and save costs, but it will make editors and reporters more lenient, as well as contribute to spreading false information faster. "For example, during the recent Women's World Cup, fake content about the Vietnamese women's team went terribly "viral" through memes created from tools using AI, causing the general psychology of a segment of the audience to be pushed to extreme extremes," journalist Nguyen Hoang Nhat gave an example.
Overseas, News Guard found a startling statistic: 347 news sites that look like legitimate news sites are full of AI-generated content and promote misinformation. A recent study by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) found that people are more likely to believe AI-generated misinformation than human-generated fake news.
According to journalist Nguyen Hoang Nhat, this reality puts the news industry in a position where it must find ways to protect its creative content and intellectual property, but also cannot turn its back on the conveniences that AI brings.
Assessing the challenges in the truthfulness of news, Associate Professor Dr. Nguyen Ngoc Oanh said that although Chat GPT has many outstanding features, in the end, it is just a tool that journalists must learn to master, use it to serve their work activities to create works and press products according to the principles of the profession. The issue of verifying the sources of information of reporters and journalists is extremely important if they do not want to "help" the spread of inaccurate information.
Through many seminars and discussions on artificial intelligence, it is concluded that the risk of using fake data and news in journalistic works is very high if content management in the editorial office cannot keep up with the development of digital technology. In the context that the legal corridor for digital journalism in Vietnam has not yet caught up with reality, legal troubles, threats to media security, copyright infringement cases and controversies about journalistic ethics, social responsibility of the press when applying automated journalism... are major challenges today.
Phan Hoa Giang
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