Microsoft-Powered New York City Chatbot Advises Illegal Practices
March 29, 2024
New York City's chatbot, launched under Mayor Eric Adams's plan to assist businesses, has been reportedly providing dangerously inaccurate legal advice. The Microsoft-powered bot allegedly informed users that landlords can refuse Section 8 vouchers and that businesses can operate cash-free, among other falsehoods. The city acknowledges the chatbot is a pilot program and commits to improvements while the errors are addressed.
- Alleged deployer
- new-york-city-government, eric-adams-administration
- Alleged developer
- microsoft, new-york-city-office-of-technology-and-innovation
- Alleged harmed parties
- new-york-city-small-business-owners, new-york-city-landlords-and-tenants, new-york-city-employers-and-employees, eric-adams-administration
Source
Data from the AI Incident Database (AIID). Cite this incident: https://incidentdatabase.ai/cite/714
Data source
Incident data is from the AI Incident Database (AIID).
When citing the database as a whole, please use:
McGregor, S. (2021) Preventing Repeated Real World AI Failures by Cataloging Incidents: The AI Incident Database. In Proceedings of the Thirty-Third Annual Conference on Innovative Applications of Artificial Intelligence (IAAI-21). Virtual Conference.
Pre-print on arXiv · Database snapshots & citation guide
We use weekly snapshots of the AIID for stable reference. For the official suggested citation of a specific incident, use the “Cite this incident” link on each incident page.