This Week’s Science News from SWTG

AI Manipulation & China's Quantum Breakthrough

This is how they use AI to manipulate us

AI is about to change the world dramatically, but not in the way you think. Next up isn’t mass unemployment, but mass manipulation. The current AIs are gold for scammers, but that’s not all there is to it. They’re also being used to wield political influence, to sell products, and to nudge each of your decisions into a direction that someone else prefers. There isn’t much we can do to prevent them from trying, but the more we know about it, the better we can avoid falling for it.

The reason the current AIs and large language models (LLMs) are so good at manipulating us is that they can tailor messages to your specific personal details. They know where you’re coming from, probably literally. Where do they get this personal information? Well from guys like this.

[Publicis CEO Arthur Sadoun:] “Our identity is the most accurate. We address real people, not devices or cookies, and we have the highest number of identity points and attributes per person. In the US alone we see 7,000 individual attributes and 75% of what people buy.”

“Let's meet Lola. Hey Lola. At the base level, we know who Lola is, what she watches, what she reads, and who she's living with. Through the power of connected identity, we also know who she follows on social media, what she buys online and offline, where she buys, when she buys, and more importantly why she buys.”

And there is a lot of money to make from this. Scientists have studied just how convincing AI is.