Sports Illustrated is under scrutiny for allegedly using artificial intelligence (AI) to create articles with fake authors and AI-generated profile pictures, according to Futurism.
The magazine is facing backlash and has promised to take down the articles while they conduct an investigation into the matter. Two Sports Illustrated writers, “Drew Ortiz” and “Sora Tanaka,” have been identified as fake Futurism. Their biographies and photos are traced back to AI-generated sources.
Not only did Futurism identify the fake authors, but they also noted that the language used in the AI-generated content within the articles was typical of machine-generated content.
Arena Group, the owner of Sports Illustrated, has denied publishing AI-generated articles, claiming they were “licensed content” produced a third-party company. This explanation comes as the company had announced earlier in February to begin experimentation with AI while assuring the public that it wouldn’t “crank out AI content.”
This controversy is not unique to Sports Illustrated, as other digital publishers have also faced backlash for using AI. For instance, newspaper publisher Gannett paused its rollout of AI-generated sports articles in August due to social media mockery, while tech publication CNET scrapped its AI experiment over inaccuracies in articles.
Generative AI’s rise has raised concerns about the potential for substandard and plagiarized content to flood the internet. A report from NewsGuard in August identified dozens of sites using chatbots to produce news stories from respected outlets, labeling it as “turbocharged plagiarism.”
This article is definitely gaining traction in the sphere of digital news and continuing to make waves. While reaching out to Arena Group for comment, the company did not respond to requests for comments Business Insider outside of normal working hours.