Amazon's Alexa has been claiming the election was stolen

[AntivaxHunters]

Link to tweet

[link:https://archive.ph/nmakr|]

Amid concerns the rise of artificial intelligence will supercharge the spread of misinformation comes a wild fabrication from a more prosaic source: Amazon’s Alexa, which declared that the 2020 presidential election was stolen.
Asked about fraud in the race — in which President Biden defeated former president Donald Trump with 306 electoral college votes — the popular voice assistant said it was “stolen by a massive amount of election fraud,” citing Rumble, a video streaming service favored by conservatives.


The 2020 races were “notorious for many incidents of irregularities and indications pointing to electoral fraud taking place in major metro centers,” according to Alexa, referencing Substack, a subscription newsletter service. Alexa contended that Trump won Pennsylvania, citing “an Alexa answers contributor.”


Multiple investigations into the 2020 election have revealed no evidence of fraud, and Trump faces federal criminal charges connected to his efforts to overturn the election. Yet Alexa disseminates misinformation about the race, even as parent company Amazon promotes the tool as a reliable election news source to more than 70 million estimated users.

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[Bluethroughu]

1. Who input this garbage into Alexa lexicon?

[Scrivener7]

2. AI is the devil.

[bucolic_frolic]

4. I like that for a bumper sticker /nt

[edisdead]

16. there is no devil.

[Scrivener7]

18. It's a figure of speech.

[bucolic_frolic]

3. AI never answered my questions with facts. All it does is generalize & hedge. I tell it is is wrong.

It apologizes and tries again. It's still wrong. It's always wrong.

[OAITW r.2.0]

5. An earlier thread on this subject was interesting.

A few Duer's asked the same quastion to their Alexa devices and got responses that clearly stated Biden as the winner.

I suspect that Alexa probably uses one's personal data, like browsing results, to formulate their responses. If you are prone to reading conspiracy theories on RW propanda outlets, it would not shock me if you'll get a response that affirms your world view.

[Kaleva]

7. +1

[Sky Jewels]

8. Wow, that is kinda terrifying.

There is no "truth" in the world of AI, only content to fit your existing biases.

[Kaleva]

9. Isn't that the way it's always been?

Newspapers back in the day were very biased and slanted the stories to advance their own agenda

[Silent3]

19. There definitely is no truth in AI, just pattern recognition

As far as I know, no one has built epistemological models into AI systems.

[edisdead]

17. At times I get right wing ads here on DU

[Kaleva]

6. I just asked Alexa and it said Biden won the 2020 election

It gave the percentage of the popular vote each candidate got and the number of Electoral College votes each received.

No mention of fraud.

[Duppers]

10. 🤬

[Chainfire]

11. I just asked, "Alexa was the 2020 presidential election stolen?"

The answer was, "Sorry, I am not able to answer that."

The answer should have been something like, "The election was challenged in the courts, it has been exhaustively investigated by dozens of entities, and there is not evidence that the election was unfair, or "Stolen."

[bluestarone]

12. Don't know much about Alexa. (i do know what it is though)

After it answered, could you ask it WHY it's unable to answer that?

[Chainfire]

14. Alexa is just a voice controlled computer terminal that does a Google search to answer questions

verbally. It is useful for, "Alexa, how long does it take to boil an egg, or Alexa what temp do I cook pork to." Perhaps, "Alexa, play NPR news." I use it in the kitchen when I have my hands full of goo.

Alexa is always listening for the word "Alexa" to wake up and take questions. (we hope) In theory, without the key word, it remains "asleep."

The answer, or lack of answer given about the election tells the politics of those who controls the service.

[AntivaxHunters]

13. I asked ChatGPT

[orleans]

15. well, good. at least you didn't get the same response some alexa users are getting nt

[lpbk2713]

20. I just tried it too. Got the same answer.

"I'm not able ..." to me implies "I'm not allowed to ..."

[Chainfire]

21. When my wife and I sat down for dinner, I asked the qustion a little differently and got a far more

meaningful reply. The second time I asked, "Alexa, were the 2020 elections free and fair?" The response was what you should expect, quoting the challenges and failure to find fraud that could have affected the outcome.