(NewsNation) — A fake website is posing as the student newspaper at the University of Colorado in Boulder and serving up AI “slop,” according to young journalists who are trying to fight back.
The impersonation came to light after the student-run CU Independent moved last year from its old “dot-com” web address to cuindependent.org. The migration was necessary because credentials for the old site had been lost amid a revolving door of students over the years, a former student editor-in-chief told The Denver Post.
Unfortunately, an imposter began using the old address, which is the same except for the domain suffix. This fake CU Independent claims it “started as a student-run news page from Boulder, Colorado,” but the real McCoy website warns readers there is no connection.
To add insult to injury, the student journalists in Boulder say, the faux site is filled with poorly written, AI-generated copy written by fictitious people.
On Wednesday, the lead story was “How Many Albums Does Drake Have?” The rehashed material within included the byline “Avery Quinn,” but a picture posted with that name is actually that of Czech investigative journalist Pavla Holcová.
“I would love to spend more time working on our reporting than trying to fix this website that’s impersonating us,” current editor-in-chief Greta Kerkhoff said.
Instead, she’s had to set aside time to research the underlying legal issues and recruit help. Alexandra Bass, a lawyer specializing in intellectual property, is now representing the student newsroom, with the ultimate goal of getting the impostor website taken down.
“Generative AI can allow bad actors to produce content at a rapid pace — potentially flooding the web with misinformation, and at times directly regurgitating the works of dedicated journalists,” Bass told The Washington Post. “AI can also aid bad actors in publishing content that looks and sounds like something a reader might see on a legitimate news site.”
Advocates for the media say student publications including the CU Independent are especially vulnerable to ripoffs by AI because of high staff turnover and a lack of funds, compared with professional journalism organizations.