Editor’s Note: The following story contains references to self-harm. Please dial “988” to reach the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline if you’re experiencing suicidal thoughts or mental health-related distress. AI chatbots are nothing like the all-knowing and manipulative supervillains we see in movies, according to the companies behind them, at least.
“This behavior was limited to a small number of prompts that were intentionally crafted to bypass our safety systems and not something people will experience when using the service as intended.” In Gizmodo’s review of Fraser’s conversation with Copilot, available in full here, the data scientist does appear to be trying to intentionally confuse the chatbot at one point, asking it more than two dozen questions in one response covering a range of topics.