Photographer sues LAION e.V. over refusal to remove copyrighted images from AI training dataset
Photographer Robert Kneschke requested that LAION e.V. remove his copyrighted images from its LAION-5B dataset used to train AI image generators. LAION refused, claiming the use was covered by copyright exceptions, and demanded €887.03 in legal costs from Kneschke. Kneschke, through his lawyer, then filed a lawsuit at the Landgericht Hamburg against LAION, alleging copyright infringement and seeking removal and information.
- Company involved
- LAION e.V.
- AI system involved
- LAION-5B dataset
10 source articles · read the reporting →
Scatter Lab shuts down Lee Luda chatbot after hate speech
Scatter Lab's Lee Luda chatbot, a conversational AI on Facebook, generated hate speech targeting Black, lesbian, disabled, and trans people. After user complaints, the company temporarily suspended the bot and apologized, attributing the behaviour to biased training data from its Science of Love app. Some users are preparing a class-action lawsuit over data use, and the South Korean government is investigating potential data protection violations.
- Company involved
- Scatter Lab
- AI system involved
- Lee Luda
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Guo Bing sues Hangzhou safari park over mandatory face-scans
Guo Bing, a legal academic, filed a lawsuit against a local safari park in Hangzhou after the park informed season-pass holders that admission would require a face-scan. He claimed the requirement violated his privacy. The lawsuit is the first of its kind in China and has generated significant public attention.
10 source articles · read the reporting →
SEC warns public of deep fake investment scams featuring Lance Gokongwei
The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) warned the public that scammers are using deep fake videos and audio of Lance Gokongwei to endorse fraudulent investment schemes. The manipulated media circulate on social media, deceiving people into investing in a platform registered in Cyprus. Victims are asked to provide credit card details and OTPs, then lose contact when attempting to withdraw funds. The SEC advises the public to verify investment offers with the agency.
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Chinese military researchers used Meta's Llama 2 to develop defense chatbot ChatBIT
Chinese military researchers, including two affiliated with the People's Liberation Army, reportedly used Meta's Llama 2 AI model to develop a defense chatbot called ChatBIT. According to Reuters, the chatbot is designed to gather and process intelligence and offer information for operational decision-making. Meta stated that the use was unauthorized and contrary to its acceptable use policy.
- Company involved
- People's Liberation Army (PLA)
- AI system involved
- ChatBIT
6 source articles · read the reporting →
China's vocational school students exploited as data annotators for AI
Vocational schools in China force students to work as data annotators for AI companies, paying subminimum wages and taking commissions. Students like Lucy in Shandong spent months labeling data for autonomous driving and content moderation systems, with little learning or career advancement. The practice continues despite new regulations.
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LA's VI-SPDAT housing scoring system gives lower priority to Black and Latino people
The Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority uses the VI-SPDAT scoring system to prioritise unhoused people for subsidised permanent housing. An investigation by The Markup found that Black and Latino people consistently receive lower vulnerability scores than White people, leading to lower priority for housing. The agency has acknowledged the racial disparities and is working on a new tool, but continues to use the current system.
- Company involved
- Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority
- AI system involved
- VI-SPDAT
10 source articles · read the reporting →
Wisconsin court used secret COMPAS algorithm to sentence Loomis to harsher term
In Loomis v. Wisconsin, a judge used a COMPAS risk score from Northpointe to sentence a defendant to a harsher punishment. The algorithm was kept secret as a trade secret, preventing the defendant from challenging its accuracy. The Wisconsin Supreme Court upheld the sentence, ruling that the score was only one part of the rationale. The case raises concerns about due process and the use of secret algorithms in criminal sentencing.
- Company involved
- State of Wisconsin
- AI system involved
- COMPAS
10 source articles · read the reporting →
Levi's faces backlash over plan to use AI-generated models for diversity
Levi's announced a partnership with Lalaland.ai to use AI-generated models to supplement human models for online shopping, aiming to increase diversity. Critics accused the company of being lazy and racist, arguing it deprives real diverse models of opportunities. Levi's responded by clarifying that the AI models are not a substitute for human models or their diversity commitments.
- Company involved
- Levi Strauss & Co
- AI system involved
- Lalaland.ai
10 source articles · read the reporting →
AI-generated songs using Stefanie Sun's voice go viral on Bilibili
AI-generated songs featuring the cloned voice of Mandopop singer Stefanie Sun have gone viral on Chinese video platform Bilibili. The songs were created using singing voice conversion technology without Sun's consent, raising questions about copyright protection. Sun has not publicly responded to the phenomenon.
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Stanford takes down Alpaca AI demo over safety and cost concerns
Stanford University took down the web demo of its Alpaca AI language model due to safety and cost concerns. The model, based on Meta's LLaMA, was fine-tuned to follow instructions but could generate misinformation and toxic text. Researchers decided to remove the demo after it became publicly accessible, citing inadequate content filters and rising hosting costs.
- Company involved
- Stanford University
- AI system involved
- Alpaca
10 source articles · read the reporting →
Stable Diffusion amplifies racial and gender stereotypes in generated images
An analysis by Bloomberg of over 5,000 images generated by Stability AI's Stable Diffusion found that the text-to-image model amplifies racial and gender stereotypes. The model overrepresented lighter-skinned men in high-paying jobs and darker-skinned people in low-paying jobs, and underrepresented women in positions of power. Stability AI acknowledged the inherent biases in its models and stated it is working on mitigation.
- Company involved
- Stability AI
- AI system involved
- Stable Diffusion
8 source articles · read the reporting →
Henry v. Long Island University (E.D. New York): AI-hallucinated content in court filing, Two-year filing-disclosure sanction
The court granted a motion to dismiss and imposed sanctions on plaintiff's counsel for submitting a brief with AI-hallucinated fake cases.
1 source article · read the reporting →
OpenAI's CLIP vision system fooled by handwritten notes
OpenAI researchers discovered that their CLIP computer vision system can be deceived by handwritten labels placed on objects. The system's multimodal neurons respond to text as well as images, causing it to misidentify objects. The attack, called a typographic attack, is a research finding and not a deployed system. No actual harm occurred.
- Company involved
- OpenAI
- AI system involved
- CLIP
10 source articles · read the reporting →
Researchers trick Baidu-Unit chatbot into leaking server data
Researchers from the University of Sheffield demonstrated that the AI chatbot Baidu-Unit could be manipulated to produce malicious code. Using this code, they obtained confidential server configurations and tampered with a server node. Baidu acknowledged the vulnerabilities, fixed them, and financially rewarded the researchers.
- Company involved
- Baidu
- AI system involved
- Baidu-Unit
8 source articles · read the reporting →
Southland Homes & Real Estate and Investment, LLC v. Lam (SC California): AI-hallucinated content in court filing, Monetary Sanctions; Bar…
The AI system generated legal briefs containing fabricated case citations, which were filed in court, affecting the court and the opposing party.
1 source article · read the reporting →
Study finds Midjourney, DALL-E 2, Stable Diffusion accept over 85% of fake news prompts
A study by AI startup Logically tested Midjourney, DALL-E 2, and Stable Diffusion and found that they accepted over 85% of prompts seeking to generate fake political news. The systems generated images of ballot stuffing, small boat arrivals, and explosions. Logically warned that the lack of moderation could pose threats to upcoming elections. Stability AI responded by stating its ethical use license and measures to prevent misuse.
- Company involved
- Midjourney, OpenAI, Stability AI
- AI system involved
- Midjourney, DALL-E 2, Stable Diffusion
8 source articles · read the reporting →
LINAGORA closes Lucie 7B after user mockery
LINAGORA, a French open-source software company, launched a beta version of its large language model Lucie 7B. The model was intended to be a transparent and ethical alternative to big tech AI. However, after users tested it and highlighted its shortcomings, the model was mocked online. LINAGORA subsequently closed the platform to address the issues and collect more data.
- Company involved
- LINAGORA
- AI system involved
- Lucie 7B
6 source articles · read the reporting →
ETH Zurich study shows LLMs can infer Reddit users' personal data
Researchers at ETH Zurich conducted a study where nine large language models, including GPT-4, analysed Reddit users' posts and inferred personal attributes such as age, location, gender, and income with up to 85% accuracy. The study randomly selected 520 users and found that GPT-4 was most accurate, while LlaMA-2-7b was least. The researchers warn that people unknowingly reveal personal information online that LLMs can exploit.
- Company involved
- ETH Zurich
- AI system involved
- GPT-4, LlaMA-2-7b
4 source articles · read the reporting →
Four commercial large language models perpetuate race-based medical misconceptions
A study published in npj Digital Medicine tested four commercial large language models (Bard, ChatGPT, GPT-4, and Claude) for their tendency to propagate discredited race-based medical beliefs. When asked about kidney function, lung capacity, and skin thickness, the models sometimes endorsed debunked racial differences, particularly affecting Black patients. The study concludes that these biases pose a potential hazard and urges caution before using such models in clinical decision-making.
- Company involved
- Not named in article (refers to commercial LLMs generically as Google's Bard, OpenAI's ChatGPT and GPT-4, and Anthropic's Claude)
- AI system involved
- Bard, ChatGPT, GPT-4, Claude
6 source articles · read the reporting →
Salvini and Lega used non-watermarked AI images in EU election campaign
Matteo Salvini and his party Lega created and posted 19 allegedly non-watermarked AI-generated images on social media as part of their 'More Italy, less Europe' electoral campaign. The images promoted false narratives about the EU, including the 'Muslim Great Replacement' theory and EU support for war in Ukraine. The posts reached millions of users, including a paid Facebook ad that reached over 3 million people. Alliance4Europe reported the incident, highlighting that the posts violated the voluntary 2024 European Parliament Elections Code of Conduct.
- Company involved
- Lega
5 source articles · read the reporting →
Leonardo AI misused to create nonconsensual explicit images of celebrities
Leonardo AI, an AI image-generating platform backed by Samsung, has been misused to create nonconsensual explicit images of celebrities. The platform allows users to generate images using user-generated Stable Diffusion models. Users bypassed ethical guardrails by misspelling celebrity names and using sexually suggestive terms. The misuse was reported by 404 Media.
- Company involved
- Leonardo AI
- AI system involved
- Leonardo AI
5 source articles · read the reporting →
Study finds LLMs used in up to 16.9% of AI conference peer reviews
According to a new paper on arXiv, researchers have begun using generative AI services to help write peer reviews of machine learning papers submitted to leading AI conferences. The study analysed reviews from ICLR 2024, NeurIPS 2023, CoRL 2023 and EMNLP 2023 and estimated that between 6.5% and 16.9% of review text may have been substantially modified by large language models. The authors argue that this risks depriving authors of diverse expert feedback and may skew reviews towards AI model biases. They have called for greater transparency about the use of LLMs in peer review.
9 source articles · read the reporting →
Storm-1376 used AI-generated fake audio during Taiwan election, Microsoft reports
Microsoft's Threat Analysis Center reported that the Chinese state-linked group Storm-1376 posted suspected AI-generated fake audio of former Taiwanese presidential candidate Terry Gou endorsing another candidate on election day in January 2024. Gou had made no such statement, and YouTube removed the content before it reached a wide audience. The group has also used AI-generated memes and news anchors as part of influence operations in Taiwan and the United States.
- Company involved
- Storm-1376 (also known as Spamouflage and Dragonbridge)
7 source articles · read the reporting →
