Google Bard Allegedly Generates False Allegations Against Consulting Firms Used in Research Presented in Australian Parliamentary Inquiry

November 2, 2023

Australian academics allegedly used the Google Bard AI to generate case studies for a parliamentary inquiry, resulting in false accusations against prominent consulting firms. The unintended misinformation led to an apology from the academics, causing damage to all parties' reputations and sparking discussions about the importance of trustworthy AI and its role in preventing harm. This incident serves as a reminder for the need for robust AI governance, particularly when it comes to critical applications such as this one. For those interested in shaping safe and secure AI practices, consider joining Project Cerebellum via JOIN US and helping us map, measure, or manage similar incidents through our HISPI Project Cerebellum TAIM.

Matched TAIM controls

Suggested mapping from embedding similarity (not a formal assessment). Browse all TAIM controls

MEASURE 2.6 — similarity 0.620, rank 1. TAIM detail and related incidents →
MAP 4.1 — similarity 0.616, rank 2. TAIM detail and related incidents →
MEASURE 2.10 — similarity 0.615, rank 3. TAIM detail and related incidents →

Alleged deployer: james-guthrie
Alleged developer: google-bard
Alleged harmed parties: james-guthrie, james-guthrie's-co-authors, parliament-of-australia, kpmg, deloitte

Source

Data from the AI Incident Database (AIID). Cite this incident: https://incidentdatabase.ai/cite/614

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.