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AI assistants misrepresent news content 45% of the time

(www.bbc.co.uk)
429 points sohkamyung | 6 comments | 22 Oct 25 13:39 UTC | HN request time: 0.852s | source | bottom
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scarmig ◴[22 Oct 25 14:46 UTC] No.45669929[source]▶
If you dig into the actual report (I know, I know, how passe), you see how they get the numbers. Most of the errors are "sourcing issues": the AI assistant doesn't cite a claim, or it (shocking) cites Wikipedia instead of the BBC.

Other issues: the report doesn't even say which particular models it's querying [ETA: discovered they do list this in an appendix], aside from saying it's the consumer tier. And it leaves off Anthropic (in my experience, by far the best at this type of task), favoring Perplexity and (perplexingly) Copilot. The article also intermingles claims from the recent report and the one on research conducted a year ago, leaving out critical context that... things have changed.

This article contains significant issues.

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FooBarWidget ◴[22 Oct 25 15:47 UTC] No.45670942[source]▶
I wouldn't even say BBC is a good source to cite. For foreign news, BBC is outright biased. Though I don't have any good suggestions for what an LLM should cite instead.
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dontlaugh ◴[22 Oct 25 15:52 UTC] No.45671010[source]▶
The BBC has a strong right wing bias within the UK too.

There’s no such thing as unbiased.

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1. AndrewStephens ◴[22 Oct 25 16:00 UTC] No.45671144[source]▶
I love how everyone seems to agree that the BBC is horribly biased but there is fierce debate as to whether it is run by the ghost of Joseph Goebbels or if the staff start each day singing The Red Flag.

Perhaps the real bias was inside us the whole time.

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2. gadders ◴[22 Oct 25 16:06 UTC] No.45671232[source]▶
Yes, that would be the Centrist Dad take.
3. dontlaugh ◴[22 Oct 25 16:28 UTC] No.45671580[source]▶
The BBC is famous for platforming Farage and smearing Corbyn.

The Guardian is at best centre-right.

Next you’ll try to convince me that Starmer’s Labour is left wing or the Lock Ness monster is real.

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4. rsynnott ◴[22 Oct 25 16:41 UTC] No.45671734[source]▶
This isn't a new issue; Saturday Night Fry (the predecessor to a Bit of Fry and Laurie) was making fun of it in the 1980s. The BBC's commitment to 'balance' has always lead it in rather weird directions.
5. hunterpayne ◴[22 Oct 25 18:36 UTC] No.45673330[source]▶
If this is an honest take, you probably have to look to the right to see Mao's ghost. Maybe talk to other humans in real life, you might be shocked about your actual place on the political spectrum.
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6. dontlaugh ◴[22 Oct 25 18:42 UTC] No.45673394{3}[source]▶
I talk to people all the time. There are both communists and fascists in the UK on the two extremes.

However, that is currently not reflected in electoral politics or the media. The farthest left are currently the Greens, at best centre-left. On the right and far right there are Tories and Reform.