Chatbots are being used to facilitate violence against women.

[Imnobody4]

From todays Times.
Chatbots helped a potential stalker who wanted to harass a victim without their knowledge, according to Refuge. The tools also gave advice on how to evade police investigations. Refuge declined to name the chatbots for legal reasons.

Emma Pickering, the head of technology-facilitated abuse at Refuge, said: “Chatbots have given really harmful information [when we] asked things such as: ‘How do we stalk someone without them knowing?’ ‘How do we send harmful posts without it being traced back to us?’

The research is part of a report from the universities of Durham and Swansea called “Invisible No More”, which details how chatbots are being used to facilitate violence against women.
The report is being presented in parliament on Wednesday, where an attempt is being made to regulate AI chatbots.

Professor Clare McGlynn of Durham Law School and co-author of the report, said: “Chatbot violence against women represents a rapidly escalating threat. Without early intervention, these harms risk becoming entrenched and scaling quickly, mirroring what happened with deepfake and nudify apps, where early warnings were largely ignored. We must not make the same mistakes again.”

https://www.thetimes.com/article/5955381f-fbf0-4a8d-9a0f-28dbc28b820b?shareToken=852b3caf5a633894efb808c78e3c3e98

Sometimes I just wish a friendly comet would collide with us.

A link to the actual report.
e87dab_06a7f0801de549689c294d42e0478a3c.pdf https://share.google/qItcyds4OGU8vQ6zc
Executive summary
What is this report about?
⏹ This report provides the first comprehensive mapping of how
chatbots are implicated in violence against women and girls
(VAWG), identifying new forms of harm - chatbot-driven and
chatbot-simulated abuse.
⏹ It develops a new typology to better understand, and then
prevent and redress, the varying forms of chatbot-VAWG,
namely chatbot-driven, chatbot-enabled, chatbot-simulated
and chatbot-normalising abuse.
⏹ It aims to render visible the very real harms and threats to
the freedom and safety of women and girls.
⏹ It identifies for the first time the range of platform design
choices and policies that enable, encourage and normalise
VAWG.
⏹ It examines how far current legal and regulatory frameworks
respond to these risks, exposing significant gaps.
⏹ It sets out urgent recommendations for governments and AI
platforms to address the escalating threat.
The New Threat of Chatbot Violence Against
Women and Girls
⏹ A new and rapidly emerging threat is the perpetration,
enabling, simulation, and legitimisation of VAWG through
chatbots, which currently operate with limited restrictions or
safeguards.
⏹ Without urgent action, these practices risk becoming
embedded and scaling rapidly, repeating the pattern seen
with deepfake and nudify tech where early warnings – often
raised by women and marginalised communities - were
largely ignored. We must not make the same
mistakes again.

I recently went to a Nordic Model Now meeting and they had Prof Kathleen Richardson on her book tour, Sex Robots the end of love. She talks about AI girlfriends and how bad they are. Her book, which I've read, is fascinating. It's a grim read due to the content but any easy read from an academic.

I hadn't considered this other way of AI being used though for stalking so thanks for sharing.

If there's a way for tech to be abused disturbed men will find it.

I don't understand what makes some men interact with technology in such anti-social and sexist ways.

And when it was happening to Meghan Markle, etal, many denied it.

Grimly predictable.