Philadelphia Sheriff Rochelle Bilal's reelection campaign has acknowledged that dozens of news articles posted on its website—presented as positive coverage from local media outlets—were fabricated using OpenAI's ChatGPT, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported. The admission came after the newspaper found that the articles could not be located in the archives of the outlets to which they were attributed.
The campaign's unsigned statement, provided to the Inquirer, said an outside consultant for the reelection effort used ChatGPT to generate fake news articles based on talking points. The statement did not name the consultant or explain why the fabricated stories were not fact-checked before publication.
The Inquirer identified 31 headlines on the campaign site that purported to show Bilal's accomplishments in office. The articles were attributed to local media, including the Inquirer and Philadelphia broadcast affiliate stations, but searches by their stated dates and headlines turned up nothing. NBC10 spokesperson Diana Torralvo confirmed to the newspaper that one video similar to a sheriff's office headline about free gun locks was from 2016, before Bilal took office.
Bilal, first elected in 2019 on a promise to remove the "dark cloud" of corruption in the sheriff's office, has faced multiple controversies during her tenure, including accusations of operating a slush fund and allegations of abuse and retaliation. The fake articles appeared on her campaign website until a few days before the Inquirer's report.
The sheriff's office has not responded to media requests, including from Futurism, leaving unresolved questions about the consultant's identity, the campaign's review process, and whether the use of ChatGPT was directed or discretionary. The campaign's terse, unattributed statement did not address those points.
Editorial Notes