The AI-generated image of an explosion at the Pentagon that went viral across several verified Twitter accounts recently has shed light on Twitter’s paid verification programme which allows anyone to pay a fee of $8 a month and get their account verified with a blue tick. Many media outlets and people mistook the fake Bloomberg Feed account, which had a blue tick, for a Bloomberg-affiliated account.
Though Twitter later suspended the account, the damage had been done. Many investors got spooked by the image, causing the S&P 500 to drop abruptly. However, the index eventually recovered the losses. A closer look at the image showed that it showed a large plume of smoke next to a rectangular building with but a passing resemblance to the Pentagon. Moreover, Russian state-controlled news network RT had also shared the image prior to being taken down. Quite a few twitter accounts with hundreds of thousands followers also shared it and gave it a wide reach.
This incident highlighted the question of how generative AI can be used to deceive people on a massive scale. However, the Arlington fire department were swift in asserting that there was no explosion or incident in the vicinity of the Pentagon. Additionally, the whole debacle even inspired a copycat hoaxer who created an image of the White House being on fire and shared it online.
