With deepfake images recently making the news by fooling many people, we look at the issues around fake images and how to spot them.

Recent Examples 

The emergence of AI has led to an increasing output of highly convincing fake images/manipulated images/deepfake images (and deepfake videos). Motivations for making these images vary, e.g. entertainment (fun or visual effects in movies and TV), political propaganda, revenge, or harassment (to harass, embarrass, or intimidate individuals), to commit fraud, or simply for artistic expression.

Recent examples of fake images that have made the news include:

– Fake images of Pope Francis wearing what appears to be a $3,500 Balenciaga puffer coat.

– Fake images, circulated on social media, of former US President Donald Trump being arrested, and an AI-generated image on his own ‘Truth’ social media platform of him kneeling in prayer.

What Problems Can Fake Images Cause? 

Fake images/manipulated images/deepfake images can cause various problems depending on the context in which they are used. For example:

– Misinformation. Fake images can be used to spread false information, mislead people and create a false narrative. For example, doctored images of political events, protests, or disasters can create a misleading impression of what actually happened, potentially influencing public opinion or policy decisions.

– Reputational damage. Fake images can be used to damage the reputation of individuals or organisations. For example, a fake image of a celebrity engaging in illegal or immoral activity can cause significant harm to their public image.

– Legal issues. Fake images can be used as evidence in legal cases, but if they are not authentic, they can lead to wrongful convictions or acquittals. Moreover, fake images can cause copyright and intellectual property issues.

– Security threats. Fake images can be used to create security threats. For example, a fake image of a terrorist attack or a natural disaster can cause panic and chaos among people, leading to a security breach.

– Personal harm. Fake images can be used to harass, intimidate, or blackmail individuals. For example, a fake image of a person engaging in illegal or embarrassing activity can be used to blackmail or extort money from them. This gained notoriety with the trend of fake-pornographic images of well known celebrities, causing significant distress.

It should also be noted that some fake images can simply be a source of amusement or wonder over how AI has advanced and could be be seen as an example of how difficult it can now be to tell the difference between a real and a fake photo.

How Are Fake Photos Made? 

Examples of the kinds of tools now used to make fake photos include:

– More traditional photo editing software like Adobe Photoshop, e.g. using the Clone Stamp tool to duplicate elements of an image and cover up unwanted objects, or the Liquify tool to reshape and distort a person’s features.

– Online image editing tools: Several online image editing tools, such as Fotor, PicMonkey, and BeFunky, provide basic image editing capabilities that can be used to create fake photos, such as adding text, filters, and borders to an image.

Deepfake software, such as DeepFaceLab, FakeApp, and Zao, use machine learning algorithms to create realistic fake photos and videos by swapping faces or manipulating the appearance of a person.

– GANs (Generative Adversarial Networks), a type of artificial intelligence that can be used to generate realistic images. GANs consist of two neural networks, a generator that creates images and a discriminator that tries to distinguish real images from fake ones. As the generator learns, it can create more realistic images, making it a powerful tool for creating fake photos.

There are now many different AI programs that can be used to create fake images such as Generated.photos, This Person Does Not Exist: Random Face Generator, Shutterstock Generate, Jasper, Picsart, and even the next generation of ChatGPT, some of which can now instantly generate photos from a text description.

How To Spot A Fake Image 

With so many fake images around and so many AI-powered programs available, how can you spot a fake image?  Here are some common giveaways:

– Unnatural or inconsistent lighting. If the lighting in the image looks unnatural or inconsistent, such as different parts of the image having different shadows or light sources, it could be a sign that the image has been manipulated.

– Pixelation or blurring. If parts of the image look pixelated or blurred, it could be a sign that they have been altered. This is because when an image is edited, it often loses some of its original quality.

– Perspective and proportions. If the proportions or perspective in the image look distorted or inconsistent, it could be a sign that the image has been manipulated. For example, if a person’s head looks too big or too small for their body or if an object looks like it’s floating in the air, it could be a sign that it has been added to the image. It is often noted that hands can be a difficult area for fake image programs to get right, and the direction of eyes in a photo where there are multiple persons can also be a giveaway.

– Inconsistencies in shadows. If there are inconsistencies in the shadows in the image, it could be a sign that the image has been manipulated. For example, if a person’s shadow falls in a different direction than the other objects in the scene, it could indicate that the person has been added to the image.

– Lack of context. If the image lacks context or appears to be taken out of its original context, it could be a sign that it has been manipulated. For example, if an image shows a person in front of a particular background, but the person does not appear to be interacting with their surroundings, it could indicate that the person has been added to the image.

– Although it’s important to be vigilant and critical when viewing images online and to look for signs of manipulation, it’s also a good idea, if in doubt, to know how to and to try to verify the authenticity of an image by checking the original source.

Verifying Images

Verifying the authenticity of an image can be challenging, however there are several steps you can take to help determine if an image is real or has been manipulated:

– Check the source. One of the easiest ways to verify the authenticity of an image is to check its source. If the image is from a reputable news outlet, a government agency, or a trustworthy website, it is more likely to be real. However, if the image is from an unknown source or an unverified social media account, it could be fake.

– Look for metadata. Metadata is information embedded in the image file that can provide details about when and where the image was taken, the camera used, and other relevant information. You can use image analysis software or online tools to view the metadata of an image and determine if it matches the content of the image.

– Use a reverse image search. A reverse image search can help you find out where an image has been used before and whether it has been altered. You can use search engines such as Google Images or TinEye to upload the image or its URL and see if there are any matches.

– In more high-profile cases that make the news, there is also the option of consulting with experts in image analysis or forensics who can examine the image and provide a professional opinion. This can be especially helpful in cases where the image is of significant importance or is being used to influence public opinion.

Overall, verifying the authenticity of an image requires critical thinking, attention to detail and a willingness to do some research. By following these steps, you can increase your chances of determining if an image is real or fake.

What Does This Mean For Your Business? 

The pace at which AI is advancing has meant that much more convincing fake images (and videos) can be made more quickly and easily and it’s this pace that’s recently alarmed some people into calling for a 6 month pause on the development of AI systems to assess the risks (a 1,800 signature open-letter, including Elon Musk’s). Although there are many ways to spot and verify fake photos, it looks likely that this is going to become more difficult to check and we even need the help of AI to help us spot AI generated deepfakes. Even the powerful social media platforms haven’t been able to stop fake profile photos and the circulation of fake photos and videos on their platforms are cause for concern, e.g. spreading propaganda/misinformation and is something the social media platforms will need to get a firmer grip on. It could be argued that education and awareness of news and world events is one important way that people can be aware of context and be better able to develop a healthy scepticism and be more able to spot fake photos and their possible motivations. For businesses, being able to identify fake photos is an important issue from a security and legal perspective so it’s important to be familiar with popular ways to tell the difference between real and fake photos and how to verify photo (and video) authenticity.

Changes to Microsoft 365 could mean less OneDrive cloud storage and could lead to Outlook being disrupted.

Change 

In February, Microsoft announced that cloud storage used across Microsoft 365 apps and services would include Outlook.com attachments data and OneDrive data. Microsoft has warned that this change could reduce how much cloud storage users have available to use with their OneDrive and, if the cloud storage quota is reached, the ability of users to send and receive emails in Outlook.com will be disrupted.

What’s Included In Microsoft cloud storage? 

A user’s Microsoft storage quota applies to a personal Microsoft account and includes OneDrive files and photos, e.g. personal files uploaded and synchronised from a computer or mobile device, such as Office documents, photos and other files saved to OneDrive, and items in the recycle bin. It also includes Outlook.com attachments and email in-line images, Microsoft Teams message attachments and recordings.

What Does This Mean? 

Whereas users used to be allowed to have a maximum of 15GB of storage in their cloud-hosted email which included text and attachments, and 5GB in their OneDrive storage, attachments now count as part of the 5GB OneDrive allowance. This is not just a significant reduction of storage space available as part of the account but also means the threat of disruption to services if/when the smaller storage quota is reached. Also, the change means that unless users keep deleting emails with attachments (which few people are likely to do) that could push them over the new limit.

Not Aware 

Another problem may be that many users may simply not be aware of the recent policy change and could face disruption without knowing why.

There have also been reports of users who were unaware that the attachments shifting over to OneDrive were the cause of their email problems and deleted a lot of emails in response, only to discover that this didn’t change the “storage used” amount.

Gradual Rollout 

The fact that Microsoft says that the new storage change is to have a gradual rollout also puts the responsibility onto users to keep checking their Windows settings, and Microsoft account to see if they are likely to experience some storage problems.

Subscription  

Some commentators have suggested that the policy change could lead some users to think that it’s a move by Microsoft to make users buy a subscription by the back door.

What Does This Mean For Your Business? 

For users who’ve had a Microsoft account for some time, this change may not only take them by surprise and potentially cause some confusion and disruption but may also leave them feeling annoyed that they’re being pushed towards either buying a subscription to get 50GB of email storage or facing the extra work of having to keep deleting emails with attachments. If users are already invested with their Microsoft account, the barrier to switching may seem high, however some online commentators have pointed out that Google’s Gmail accounts come with a 15GB limit which may have seemed an attractive alternative.

A new study has shown that using underground water to maintain comfortable temperatures could reduce consumption of natural gas and electricity in this sector by 40 per cent, thereby offering a green heating and cooling solution.

The Issue 

With a massive 12 per cent of the total global energy demand coming from heating and cooling homes and businesses, finding a green way to meet this demand could be a major step forward in reducing the consumption of natural gas and electricity, thereby helping the environment.

The Solution – ATES? 

One green method for meeting this demand could be using aquifer thermal energy storage (ATES).

ATES is a sustainable technology that utilises the subsurface temperature differences of groundwater to store thermal energy for heating and cooling purposes e.g., for heating and cooling buildings. This technique involves extracting groundwater from a shallow or deep aquifer, passing it through a heat exchanger system to extract heat or coolness, and then reinjecting the water back into the same or another aquifer.

During the summer season, the warm water from the building’s cooling system is transferred to the cold groundwater and then re-injected into the ground. In the winter season, the process is reversed, where the heat stored in the groundwater is extracted to provide warmth to the building.

Highly Efficient & Cost-Effective 

ATES is a highly energy-efficient and cost-effective technology for space heating and cooling, which results in lower greenhouse gas emissions compared to conventional HVAC systems. ATES can be used in a variety of applications, including residential, commercial, and industrial buildings. It is also suitable for district heating and cooling systems, which can serve a large number of buildings in an area.

The Study 

The study, published in Applied Energy, looks at how ATES could fit into the larger goal of decarbonising U.S. energy systems by storing intermittent renewable energy which could be used when the sun isn’t shining, and the turbines aren’t spinning. In the study, researchers built a technological and economic simulation of an energy system. The study’s authors found that ATES is an option for heating and cooling energy storage that, like batteries, could help end human reliance on fossil fuel-derived backup power and enable a fully renewable grid.

Simple But Effective 

The ATES concept is simple because it uses the existing natural heat-absorbing property of water and the natural geological features. ATES involves the process of pumping water up from existing underground reservoirs, heating it at the surface in the summer with environmental heat or excess energy from solar, or any time of the year with wind, and then pumping back down, ready to use the stored heat in the colder months.

How Effective Are Underground Aquafers At Storing Heat? 

Underground aquifers are highly effective at storing heat because they have a large thermal mass, which means they can store a significant amount of heat energy. Aquifers are typically made up of porous rock or soil layers that can absorb and store water, which can be used to store thermal energy.

That said, the effectiveness of underground aquifers at storing heat depends on several factors, such as the depth and size of the aquifer, the properties of the soil or rock layers, and the flow rate of groundwater.

The Deeper The Better 

Deep aquifers are more effective at storing heat than shallow aquifers because the temperature of the water is more stable at greater depths, although it could be said that the earth is generally a good insulator.

All things considered, underground aquifers are an excellent and highly effective method for storing heat energy, which can help to reduce energy costs and greenhouse gas emissions associated with heating and cooling buildings.

A Relatively High-Cost Method 

The study showed that adding ATES to the grid could reduce consumption of petroleum products by up to 40 per cent. However, using ATES could cost 15 to 20 per cent more than existing energy storage technologies.

Other Benefits 

Other benefits of using ATES could include:

– Unlike above-ground tank-based water or ice storage systems ATES doesn’t need to take up space.

– Compared with traditional geothermal heat pump systems that rely on heat transfer with the underground earth soil, ATES is more efficient and can be more easily scaled up for large community cooling or heating.

– ATES has the potential to become more efficient as weather becomes more extreme in the coming years due to climate change.

– ATES could make the future grid more resilient to outages caused by high power demands during heat waves because ATES-driven cooling needs less electricity than air conditioners, and it only needs enough power to pump the water around.

What Does This Mean For Your Organisation?

Although more expensive than existing energy storage technologies, ATES offers businesses a natural, green way to heat and cool buildings that actually takes advantage of current climate change temperature extremes e.g., supercharging the amount of free thermal energy that can be stored. Using ATES could also make future grid more resilient to outages caused by high power demands during heat waves, thereby causing less disruption to businesses. Combine these points with the fact that ATES is efficient and can relatively easily scaled up and it’s clear that ATES could offer a greener, realistic alternative to conventional HVAC systems in the future.

Imagine for a moment that it’s April 14th, 1912 and just moments ago you were having a pleasant evening onboard one of the most luxurious and largest ships of its time. However, you are now sitting in a tiny lifeboat, surrounded by pitch black freezing water waiting for rescue.

This was stark reality for the 706 survivors of the Titanic disaster. It was around 23:40 (ship’s time) when the Titanic struck the iceberg. Many of the passengers would have been sleeping, while others were enjoying many of the attractions the ship had to offer. One thing is certain, they were completely unaware of the dreadful events about to unfold. In the early morning of April 15, the Titanic would sink.

More than 1,500 people lost their lives that night. To this day, the Titanic remains one of the deadliest marine disasters ever, during peacetime. Nevertheless it could still have been worse, had the crew not been able to send a distress call out using wireless telegraphy owned by the Marconi Company.

Having received the distress call, RMS Carpathia began making its way to the Titanic’s position and upon arrival, the ship would take all the survivors the found onboard and take them to New York. Two other ships arrived after the Carpathia; the Mount Temple and Californian. However, by then there were no more survivors found or picked up.

20 years prior to this tragedy in the early 1890s, a man named Guglielmo Marconi was working on ‘wireless telegraphy’, not knowing that his technology would help save those 706 lives. The idea was not new, yet no previous attempts were technically or commercially successful. Initially, he was only able to transmit signals up to half a mile but his persistent efforts resulted in a breakthrough in the summer of 1895 when he discovered greater ranges could be achieved by raising the antenna and grounding the transmitter and receiver.

Later, Marconi started investigating ways to transmit signals across the Atlantic which would eventually lead him to establishing a regular transatlantic radio-telegraph service. The radio operators onboard the Titanic were employees of the Marconi Company, not of the Titanic’s White Star Line. It was only after the tragic sinking of the Titanic that the value of radio in maritime safety was brought to public attention and Marconi acquired significantly more fame as a result.

Ironically, Marconi was nearly a victim himself of the Titanic’s fateful voyage as his reputation, achievements and Nobel prize-winning status had helped earn him a free passage on the famous maiden voyage. However, as it turned out, he’d opted to travel three days earlier aboard the RMS Lusitania instead. The Lusitania itself sank just over a year later, although rather than running into an iceberg, she instead met with a torpedo fired from a German submarine just south of Ireland, killing the passengers and crew, thereby contributing towards the United States entering the first world war.

The story of Titanic highlights the critical role technology plays in saving lives and avoiding disasters and of course the owner’s hubris around thinking that his ‘unsinkable’ ship needed so few lifeboats should never be forgotten.

YouTube is warning users of a phishing attempt showing no-reply@youtube.com as the sender. YouTube’s owner Google is, therefore, advising users to be cautious, not to download/access any file received in such an email and, while it investigates, to follow these tips to stay safe from phishing: https://support.google.com/youtube/thread/16231981

With the UK government’s new ‘Emergency Alerts’ system now live, we take a look at what it is and how it will work.

What Are ‘Emergency Alerts’? 

The UK government’s Emergency Alerts service, managed by the government’s Cabinet Office, enables the government to send important public safety messages directly to people’s mobile phones in specific geographic areas during emergencies.

What Kind Of Emergencies? 

This system is designed to alert people of situations that may threaten their safety, such as severe weather, industrial incidents or terrorist attacks and is only to be used in times of serious emergencies.

The government says, “in the UK, alerts could be used to tell residents of villages being encroached by wildfires, or of severe flooding” and that “their initial use will focus on the most serious severe weather-related incidents, including severe flooding in England.” 

To Be Used Very Rarely 

The plan is that Emergency Alerts will be used very rarely and will only be sent where there is an immediate risk to people’s lives.

The government says the Emergency Alerts system will “… bolster the UK’s resilience and provides the capability to send alerts direct to mobile phones when there is a risk to life”. 

How Does It Work? 

The alerts are going to be sent via a technology called ‘Cell Broadcast,’ which enables messages to be sent to all mobile phones within range of designated mobile phone towers. This means that alerts are targeted to people in specific areas, rather than being sent to all phones across the country. The government says the system will be able to get urgent messages quickly to nearly 90 percent of mobile phones in a defined area.

When an alert is sent, a loud siren-like sound will play, and a message will appear on the screen of the phone. The message will provide information about the emergency situation and instructions on what to do next.

UK-Wide Test Planned For The Evening Of Sunday 23 April 

Although the system is now live and there have been successful tests in East Suffolk and Reading, the UK government is warning that a UK-wide alerts test will take place in the early evening of Sunday 23 April. This will see people receive a test message on their mobile phones.

Has Worked Well In Other Countries 

Emergency Alerts services have already been used successfully in a number of other countries, including the US, Canada, the Netherlands, and Japan, where they have been credited with saving lives, for example, during severe weather events.

Well Received 

The introduction of an Emergency Alerts service has been well received by emergency services in the UK.

For example, Chair of the National Fire Chiefs Council, Mark Hardingham, said: “We’ve seen this type of system in action elsewhere across the world and we look forward to having the facility here in the UK – by working together with fire services and partners we want this system to help us to help you be as safe as you can if a crisis does hit.” 

Also, as highlighted by Executive Director for Flood and Coastal Erosion Risk Management at the Environment Agency, Caroline Douglass: “Being able to communicate warnings in a timely and accurate manner during incidents is really important to help people take action to protect themselves, their families, and their neighbours.” 

Privacy Protected

For those worried about the potential for privacy and security issues related to the service, the UK government is assuring people that it will only broadcast from cell towers in the vicinity of an emergency, the alerts are secure, free to receive, and one-way. The government also says that the broadcast won’t reveal anyone’s location, no personal data will be collected, and the alerts can only be sent by authorised Governmental and Emergency Services users.

What Does This Mean For Your Business? 

With climate change-related weather incidents on the increase, a pandemic and its changing restrictions just passed, terror incidents in cities, and with most people now owning a mobile-phone, Emergency Alerts sounds like a good idea in theory. It has worked well in other countries and so should work here and if it can help to protect businesses and individuals from the worst excesses of weather incidents (for example), buy them vital time and save lives, then there can be few compelling arguments against it. There are, however, always concerns about privacy although the government has given assurances that the system will operate in a very private and localised way.

There have been reports of scammers are using the latest AI deepfake voice clones to sound like family members in distress to swindle relatives out of money.

AI Voice Technology 

The kinds of artificially generated voice technology tools that bad actors could be using for ‘imposter scams’ may include  ElevenLabs, Murf, Play.ht, Respeecher, Resemble, Overdub, ReadSpeaker, Voice.ai, and many more.

How Are Voices Cloned? 

Typically, AI voice cloning software can take a short voice sample of the human voice you want to replicate, analyse it, learn it, and replicate it (instantly). This cloned, ‘deepfake’ voice can then be replicated reading any script provided to it.

How Do These Imposter Scams Work? 

As highlighted in a recent US Washington Post report, a common form of the scam involves the scammers obtaining a short (just seconds) audio sample of a person’s voice (e.g. from YouTube, podcasts, TikTok, Instagram or a Facebook video). The scammer then runs this through voice cloning software and makes a short clip of the person sounding distressed and asking for money to be transferred to help them (e.g. for legal fees). This audio clip is then played down the phone to loved ones (e.g. parents or grandparents) who are duped and react by transferring funds into the bitcoin account (because it’s not traceable) named in the scammer’s audio clip, or named in a follow-up phone call by the scammers.

How Big Is The Problem?

US Federal Trade Commission statistics show that in 2022, the impostor scam was the most frequent type of fraud reported and generated the second-highest losses for those targeted, e.g. out of 36,000 reports, more than 5,000 victims lost $11 million in scams over the phone.

Examples 

Some examples of AI deepfake voice ‘imposter’ scams include:

– A Canadian couple being scammed out of $21,000 following a phone call from someone claiming to be a lawyer who told them their son was in jail for killing a diplomat in a car accident and needed legal fees.

– Ruth Card, a Saskatchewan (Canada) grandmother who (would have) paid $9,400 to help pay legal fees for her grandson (if the bank hadn’t intervened) following a bogus accident explained in an AI fake phone call from her grandson and a call from bogus lawyer on his behalf.

Complicated 

This type of scam is difficult to stop for several reasons, such as:

– There are now so many voice cloning options, many of which are free and don’t require proof of whose voice is being cloned or the customer making the clip.

– The scam phone calls can be made from anywhere in the world.

– It’s difficult to decide which agencies have jurisdiction to investigate which cases if the scammers operate out of different countries

– The bitcoin accounts that money is paid into can’t be traced.

– There’s no insurance to re-imburse victims for the money.

– Courts have not yet decided when/if companies are liable for harm caused by AI deepfake voice technology and AI companies are showing no signs of slowing down the release of new AI services and features.

What Does This Mean For Your Business? 

Deepfake technology that enables people to generate highly realistic images, videos and audio of people is prevalent and although it presents opportunities (e.g. creating videos or realistic avatars for businesses and special effects in films), it is essentially unregulated and clearly has the potential for misuse, such as the spread of misinformation and fraud.

There are currently fears that the technology is advancing and being made publicly available too quickly and is too far ahead of an assessment of the risks and any regulation (hence the recent open letter including Elon Musk’s signature). Deepfake scams present another real, significant and growing risk to businesses and the advice on receiving such a call should be to try and remain calm and sceptical, have a system in place before funds can be transferred where checks must be made, and to first try to contact the person directly for whom the funds are required. That said, voice cloning technology is incredibly good, scammers can be very convincing, and it is difficult for people to fight a strong emotional response to help their loved ones and friends. Some people believe that more needs to be done in the first instance to make voice cloning software companies have more checks in place and to perhaps become liable in some way if fraud is carried out using their services.

Embattled Chinese owned short-video-sharing platform TikTok has received a £12.7m fine from the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) for breaching UK data protection law by failing to protect children’s privacy when using the TikTok platform.

Notice Of Intent Issued Last Year

The ICO issued TikTok Inc and TikTok Information Technologies UK Limited (‘TikTok’) with the ‘notice of intent’ (a legal document that precedes a potential fine) back in September 2022.

Issues 

At the time (following an investigation), the ICO’s published its (then provisional) view that TikTok may have breached UK data protection law between May 2018 and July 2020.

The ICO investigation found the company processed the data of children under the age of 13 without appropriate parental consent, failed to provide proper information to its users in a concise, transparent, and easily understood way, and processed special category data, without legal grounds to do so.

How Many? 

The ICO estimates that TikTok allowed as many as 1.4 million UK children under the age of 13 to use the platform in 2020, despite having set 13 as the minimum age to create a TikTok account.

UK Data Protection Law 

Under the UK’s GDPR, platforms that offer information to children under the age of 13 must obtain parental consent before collecting, processing, or storing any personal data of children. This includes information such as their name, address, location, and other identifying information.

GDPR also requires that controllers of personal data must take appropriate measures to ensure that the processing of personal data of children is lawful, fair, and transparent. Additionally, platforms must ensure that the personal data of children is secure and protected from unauthorised access.

Didn’t Abide By The Law 

Speaking about its decision to impose the £12.7b million fine, UK Information Commissioner John Edwards said: “There are laws in place to make sure our children are as safe in the digital world as they are in the physical world. TikTok did not abide by those laws.” 

Disagree 

A TikTok spokesperson is reported to have disagreed with the decision and commented: “We invest heavily to help keep under 13s off the platform and our 40,000 strong safety team works around the clock to help keep the platform safe for our community.”  

However, the spokesperson said the company was “pleased that the fine announced today has been reduced to under half the amount proposed last year” (it was originally proposed to be £27 million!).

Trouble Over TikTok 

This announcement has come at a time when TikTok has faced questions and sanctions from many countries. For example, just some recent setbacks for TikTok have included:

– Banning of the TikTok app from EU, US, Australia, New Zealand, and Indian government devices over privacy and security concerns and a possible link to the Chinese state, plus more trouble on the way in Canada.

– Banning of the app in Italy over data privacy concerns.

– TikTok boss Shou Zi Chew being called to face questions at the US Congress over possible close links between the company and the Chinese state.

What Does This Mean For Your Business? 

This fine relates to a data protection offence, albeit a serious one because it relates to young users, which dates back several years. Although the fine seems large and TikTok doesn’t fully agree with the decision, the company appears to be pleased that the fine is less than half of the £27 million originally suggested. TikTok has had nothing but bad publicity lately, so this fine is another in a series of difficulties that look set to continue for the company as it is embroiled in both political and privacy arguments in several countries. That said, GDPR applies to all and protecting young social media users has become a very prominent and important issue in recent years as more stories emerge of the harm caused to them, e.g. via damaging online content, bullying, grooming and abuse. Protecting the personal data of children is something that arguably, many social media platforms could be much better at and the UK’s Online Safety Bill is another mechanism that this country’s government is using to force social media platforms and chat apps to take their responsibilities more seriously. Data protection issues aside, TikTok is likely to face more hostility going forwards while the West’s relationship with China remains poor.

Following the news that a student made a successful appeal against a parking ticket by using a letter written by the ChatGPT chatbot, we look at how it happened, how to get the best results from ChatGPT, and we look at some of the recent concerns about the advances in AI technology.

£60 Parking Ticket 

22-year-old York student Millie Houlton received a £60 parking notice recently from York City Council.

Although she strongly believed that the fine (for parking in her own street) had been issued in error because she had a permit to do so, she turned to the ChatGPT chatbot for help in writing a letter of appeal against the parking ticket by giving it the instructions “please help me write a letter to the council, they gave me a parking ticket”. 

Miss Houlton has been reported as saying about ChatGPT’s response to her instructions that: “I put in all my details about where and when it happened, why it was wrong and my reference for the fine and it came back with this perfectly formed personalised response within minutes.”

Fine Withdrawn 

After sending off ChatGPT’s appeal letter, she was surprised and delighted to receive a response from the council telling her that the parking fine had been withdrawn.

Help From ChatGPT 

This story shows one of the many valuable uses of an advanced conversational chatbot. ChatGPT can assist a person in writing responses to many different types official or legal letters and notices by providing relevant information and language that is appropriate for the situation. If you’d like to use ChatGPT in this way, here are tips to help you get the best possible letter from it:

– Provide context: Start by providing ChatGPT with the relevant details about the letter or notice you received. This could include the sender, the date of the letter, and the nature of the request or issue.

– Provide the text of the letter or notice: You can copy and paste the text of the letter or notice into the chat with ChatGPT. This will allow it to analyse the language used and provide suggestions for how to respond.

– Provide any relevant information: If there is any information that you think is relevant to the situation, be sure to provide it to ChatGPT. This could include documentation, receipts, or other evidence.

– Use ChatGPT’s suggestions: Based on the information you provide, ChatGPT can generate a response that is appropriate for the situation. It can suggest language to use and provide guidance on the tone and style of the response.

– Edit and refine: Once ChatGPT has provided a response, you can edit and refine it to make sure that it accurately reflects your position and addresses the issues at hand. You may need to make adjustments to the wording or tone to ensure that your response is appropriate for the situation.

Beware 

It is worth remembering however, that however plausible ChatGTP’s output appears to be, it can have some shortcomings.

As an AI language model, ChatGPT is programmed to generate responses based on the patterns and information it has learned from the large corpus of data it was trained on. Like any machine learning model therefore, ChatGPT makes mistakes, produces incorrect or irrelevant information, and even generates and shares misinformation or disinformation, especially if it is fed with biased or unreliable data.

It is also important to remember that ChatGPT does not have the ability to verify the accuracy of the information it generates or assess the reliability of its sources. The chatbot has been designed and trained to mimic human language, but obviously does not have consciousness, intention, or moral values. This means that although it is not capable of intentionally lying or deceiving (as far as we know), it can nevertheless produce misleading or false information (especially if the input data is biased or incomplete).

Privacy Concerns 

There are also concerns that ChatGPT may not be compliant with GDPR’s privacy guidelines, and this has led to ChatGPT being banned in Italy. The Italian data watchdog’s concerns centre around:

– Whether there is a legal basis for the mass collection and storage of personal data to be used for ‘training’ the chatbot’s algorithms.

– Whether the inability to verify the age of ChatGPT users could result in minors being exposed to unsuitable answers compared to their degree of development and awareness.

What To Do 

To avoid sharing a ChatGTP output (e.g. an important letter) that isn’t accurate, users should evaluate, fact-check, and cross-check the information with other reliable sources before using the response for any critical or important decision-making.

Also, to minimise the risk of misinformation or disinformation, it is recommended to use ChatGPT in conjunction with basic human critical thinking, human judgment, alongside other reliable sources of information, plus to try and ensure that the input data is accurate, complete, and comes from a variety of reputable sources.

To minimise the risk of privacy issues, ChatGPT users should not share personal, private, and identifiable information with the chatbot.

What Does This Mean For Your Business? 

It’s still early days for the mass usage of powerful conversational chatbots – ChatGTP was only introduced in November, but search engines like Bing have already incorporated OpenAI’s chatbot technology, Google Bard is about to be introduced and Copilot is being integrated with Windows 365. Having access to the incredible capabilities and versatility of chatbots like ChatGPT has revealed many possibilities, e.g. getting parking tickets revoked (chatbots can pass legal exams).

Businesses have found that ChatGPT has saved them time, money, and helped them avoid the drudgery of some work.

Others, however, such as the 1,000 AI experts (including Elon Musk) who signed an open letter calling on all AI development to be paused for six months, are concerned that conversational chatbot technology is going too fast and could be exposing people, businesses and even humanity to existential risk. These concerns have, no doubt, been heightened with the news that OpenAI’s  GPT-5 is scheduled to complete training this December and it is so powerful that OpenAI expects to achieve Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) whereby its chatbot could perform any intellectual task that a human being can!

There are also concerns that as much as chatbots can help with work, they could also threaten jobs or be used for malicious purposes, so while although the UK government has no plans for a UK AI regulator, it does plan to regulate artificial intelligence with new guidelines on “responsible use”. That said, it also recognises the contribution to the economy of AI.

The next few months look like being an exciting (or terrifying) and undoubtedly disruptive period as more businesses discover just how many unexpected ways that ChatGPT and other chatbots can be used to help them to add value and reduce costs.