In the face of "AI rumors", how do the police deal with it

Recently, the police reported that "Qin Lang Paris lost his summer vacation homework" was a photo shoot, which once again aroused the society's attention to the management of online rumors.

Stimulated by the "traffic economy", the speed of dissemination, the scope of influence, and the social harmfulness of online rumors have increased significantly, seriously disrupting social and public order and infringing on the legitimate rights and interests of citizens. The Ministry of Public Security has launched special campaigns to "crack down on online rumors" and "crack down on online violence". Since December last year, public security organs across the country have investigated more than 80,000 clues on online rumors, investigated and handled more than 10,000 cases of online rumors, arrested more than 1,500 criminal suspects, imposed administrative penalties on more than 10,700 people, and carried out more than 4,200 public rumors.

Using AI technology to publish false information

"In recent years, there have been new trends in online rumors, and criminals often keep up with social hotspots and emergencies, and use new artificial intelligence (AI) technologies to superimpose and detonate social public opinion, making online rumors extremely disseminated and destructive, bringing serious harm to social order. Han Xinyi, director of the Political Department of the Cyber Security Corps of the Shanghai Municipal Public Security Bureau, said.

According to reports, in the special operation to crack down on online rumors, the Shanghai Qingpu police relied on the anti-rumor coordination mechanism to investigate and deal with a case of fabricating facts to disrupt public order. In this case, in order to increase exposure and win traffic, the people involved in the case entered keywords and used AI to fabricate articles about the fatal case in Qingpu District, and downloaded the network map on the Internet, moved the flowers, and posted it on the Internet to attract the attention of netizens, and were later administratively detained in accordance with the law.

With the development of science and technology, it is not uncommon to use AI to publish false information to "attract attention". Recently, the Pingyao County Public Security Bureau in Shanxi Province cracked a case of using AI technology to falsify crime scenes to spread rumors.

At about 8 o'clock in the morning on March 26, the Cyber Security Brigade of the Pingyao County Public Security Bureau found a "news" with a terrifying headline: "When a woman and her boyfriend were eating on Mingqing Street in the ancient city of Pingyao, they stabbed the child's face with a bamboo stick, and the child was carried away by '120', and his life and death were uncertain." The "news" was also accompanied by video screenshots of the scene of the incident and hot discussion records of netizens, which instantly sparked a lot of discussion and speculation.

After comparison, the police confirmed that the incident did not occur in the Ming and Qing Dynasties of Pingyao Ancient City, and there were obvious discrepancies between the content described in the "news" and the facts. Later, the person involved in the case, Zhao, admitted that in order to attract attention and increase clicks, he deliberately used AI technology to synthesize and publish this fake news about the ancient city of Pingyao. At present, Zhao has been placed under administrative detention.

Fabricating online rumors by taking advantage of hot cases

"The number of online rumors fabricated by artificial intelligence is on the rise. With the development and application of generative artificial intelligence, video synthesis and other technologies, criminals use new technologies and applications to imitate the style of news media to generate rumor information with one click, which makes the generation of such online rumors simpler and more confusing, increasing the difficulty of screening and detection. Guo Peng, political commissar of the Cyber Security Corps of the Shanxi Provincial Public Security Department, said.

Guo Peng pointed out: "Rumors involving public order, food safety, people's livelihood policies, etc., can easily cause public panic, not only mislead the public, but are more likely to cause social disorder and affect government decision-making and credibility." In order to chase the 'traffic economy', some self-media maliciously fabricate and hype up the trend, and individual lawbreakers often take advantage of the emotions of netizens to fabricate extremely demagogic and harmful online rumors in some sensitive hot events, causing a crisis of social trust. In addition, online rumors are often accompanied by the occurrence of online violence, and some online rumors target specific individuals or groups to maliciously attack, slander and slander, infringe on or expose the privacy information of others, and endanger the safety of people's lives and property. ”

Since December last year, the Shanxi Provincial Public Security Organs have verified a total of 204 clues on online rumors, investigated and handled 97 cases of online rumors and online violence, investigated and punished 147 illegal and criminal personnel in accordance with the law, guided key website platforms to clean up 705 pieces of online rumor information, and shut down 97 accounts that violated laws and regulations in accordance with the law.

"Judging from the work of the Shanxi Provincial Public Security Organs' special campaign to crack down on and rectify online rumors, the current concentration of online rumors related to the field of people's livelihood is relatively concentrated; hot incidents involving natural disasters and sudden security accidents are prone to breed online rumors; and online rumors involving false police information occur from time to time. Guo Peng said that after the occurrence of disasters and dangers, criminals in order to chase traffic and attract people's attention, take advantage of netizens' concern for disasters and dangers, not only fabricate rumors and information out of nothing, but even "synthesize" the graphic information, audio and video of the previous disasters by grafting, causing social panic and seriously interfering with rescue and disaster relief, emergency response and other work.

"In 2024, as the year of the special action to crack down on and rectify online rumors, Shanxi public security organs will continue to make efforts to further improve their ability to crack down on illegal and criminal acts of online rumors, and build a safer, clearer, and more orderly cyberspace. Guo Peng said.

Improve the level of comprehensive governance of the network ecosystem

On April 12, the Ministry of Public Security announced 10 typical cases of cracking down on and rectifying online rumors, and the case of "Qin Lang Paris Lost Summer Vacation Homework" was among them. The other 9 typical cases are: Shandong public security organs investigated and dealt with the case of "feeding the hospitalized mother-in-law to eat instant noodles", Hubei public security organs investigated and dealt with a case of "making pornographic rumors", Shanghai public security organs investigated and dealt with a case of building a "melon-eating group" to spread rumors for profit, Hunan public security organs investigated and dealt with the case of fabricating rumors about the "tide of police resignation", Anhui public security organs investigated and dealt with the fabrication of rumors that "disaster relief materials were resold", Jiangxi public security organs investigated and dealt with a case of MCN institutions using artificial intelligence tools to spread rumors, and Chongqing public security organs investigated and dealt with the use of artificial intelligence tools to fabricate rumors. The "explosion accident" rumor case, the Jiangxi public security organ investigated and dealt with the rumor case of fabricating the rumor of "a bank collapsed", and the Guangdong public security organ investigated and dealt with the rumor case of fabricating the rumor that "Guangzhou restricts takeaway delivery".

The reporter of "Rule of Law Daily" noticed that among the above-mentioned 10 typical cases of cracking down on and rectifying online rumors, 4 cases involved the use of AI to spread rumors, among which the Guangdong public security organs' investigation and handling of the fabrication of rumors of "Guangzhou restricts takeaway delivery" is particularly typical.

It is understood that on December 19, 2023, some netizens posted on an online platform that "Guangzhou is about to become the first city in the country to restrict takeaway delivery", which quickly attracted attention and formed a hot search on the Internet. After investigation, Yang Mou, a netizen in Deyang, Sichuan, organized and recruited a number of part-time personnel such as Ye Mou, a netizen in Jiangmen, Guangdong, and used artificial intelligence tools to generate false articles in batches for drainage and profit. In order to attract attention, Ye fabricated and published the above-mentioned rumors and disrupted the normal social order, and the Guangzhou public security organs have taken criminal coercive measures against six people, including Yang and Ye.

As a new trend of rumor propagation and criminal methods, "AI rumor-mongering" has disrupted the order of public opinion, endangered the stable operation of the economy and society, and brought new challenges to the governance of online rumors. The above-mentioned typical cases reflect the unrelenting attitude of the public security organs in cracking down on "AI rumors" and their firm determination to escort high-quality economic and social development.

In terms of carrying out comprehensive governance of website platforms, since December last year, the Shanxi Provincial Public Security Organs have carried out more than 1,700 Internet security supervision and inspections, and imposed 145 rectification measures such as warnings, rectification orders, and fines on website platforms that do not perform their main responsibilities and obligations according to the severity of the circumstances, and guided and urged 134 Internet celebrities and 12 official account operators to perform their network governance responsibilities.

Since December last year, the Shanghai police have carried out all-out efforts to rectify illegal and chaotic online phenomena such as malicious hype and rumor-mongering on the Internet, and so far, a total of 384 cases of online rumors have been investigated and dealt with, more than 530 people have been investigated and punished in accordance with the law, more than 53,000 pieces of online rumor information have been cleaned up, and more than 5,000 accounts that have violated laws and regulations have been shut down in accordance with the law.

The Shanghai police said that they will continue to make more efforts to purify cyberspace, promote the special action to crack down on and rectify online rumors, strictly investigate rumor-mongering behaviors related to public safety, the economy and people's livelihood and other fields in accordance with the law, severely punish illegal and criminal personnel who maliciously reverse black and white on the Internet and spread rumors, increase the exposure of typical cases, continue to strengthen cooperation with relevant departments, consolidate the corporate responsibility of online platforms, and improve the level of comprehensive governance of the online ecosystem.

The public security organs solemnly remind that the Internet is not a place outside the law, and the majority of netizens are requested to strictly abide by relevant laws and regulations, consciously regulate their personal online words and deeds, and continuously improve their ability to identify, prevent, and resist online rumors. (Reporter Zhang Chen)

Source: Rule of Law Daily-Rule of Law Network