AI chatbots distort and mislead when asked about current affairs, BBC finds

Leading artificial intelligence assistants create distortions, factual inaccuracies and misleading content in response to questions about news and current affairs, research has found. More than half of the AI-generated answers provided by ChatGPT, Copilot, Gemini and Perplexity were judged to have "significant issues", according to the study by the BBC. The errors included stating that Rishi Sunak was still the prime minister and that Nicola Sturgeon was still Scotland's first minister; misrepresenting NHS advice about vaping; and mistaking opinions and archive material for up-to-date facts. The researchers asked the four generative AI tools to answer 100 questions using BBC articles as a source. The answers were then rated by BBC journalists who specialise in the relevant subject areas.