National: Amazon’s Alexa has been claiming the 2020 election was stolen | Cat Zakrzewski/The Washington Post
Amazon’s voice assistant, Alexa, has been found disseminating misinformation about the 2020 presidential election, falsely claiming it was stolen. When asked about fraud in the election, Alexa cited unvetted sources, including Rumble and Substack, and stated that there were “many incidents of irregularities and indications pointing to electoral fraud.” Multiple investigations have found no evidence of widespread fraud, but the misinformation from Alexa raises concerns about the spread of false narratives through AI systems. Amazon has not provided an explanation for why Alexa’s responses drew from unverified sources, but has stated that such errors were delivered a small number of times and were quickly rectified when brought to their attention. The incident highlights the potential for AI-driven systems to amplify falsehoods and biases present in their sources. Read Article