Microsoft Bing took over false accusation of sexual harassment from ChatGPT

Microsoft Bing’s chat has picked up a false accusation of sexual harassment from ChatGPT, via a news article about the chatbot being wrong. As far as we know, this is the first time that the incorrect claim has spread from one chatbot to another.

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Based on an article on the subject, Bing repeated the accusation that an American professor sexually harassed a student in 2018, writes The Washington Post. In the meantime, Bing seems to have learned that this is incorrect, because the Microsoft chatbot now presents this case as an example of how not all information found online is accurate or reliable.

It has been known for some time that OpenAI’s ChatGPT and other chatbots make up information, a phenomenon called ‘hallucination’. Allegations of sexual harassment have major consequences for those involved. In the meantime, ChatGPT is no longer making up these accusations, but is providing an answer that shows that it cannot answer within its own rules.

The incorrect information from ChatGPT ended up in a USA Today column and Bing misinterpreted that column. There have been concerns for some time that chatbots ‘feed’ each other disinformation and fake news, thereby reinforcing them.