Technology writer Joanna Stern wrote last month about the discovery of 10 fake versions of her book. I’m not a robot in Apple Books a few days after the actual article was published. While he was able to eliminate them, new ones quickly appeared.
New York Times journalist Kashmir Hill found a fake biography of herself on Amazon and discovered she was one of thousands of AI-written biographies available for sale…
open stern that most of the copies were summaries of his book, with fake authors and publishers.
In total, I found ten AI-generated e-books clearly mounted on mine, with AI-generated covers that mimicked the style of the real book: the same blue, yellow, and red color palette. Most were priced at $9.99, but some have gone as high as $20.99.
So I bought some to see how close they came to the original. Sophie Mercer’s version was essentially an AI-generated summary, with chapters and a structure that closely mirrored my own. This and the other forgeries I reviewed seemed intended to trick readers into thinking this was the original, or at least a summary of it.
She says she got Apple to remove them, but three more counterfeits quickly appeared.
I’m not alone. Lena Dunham Famous It has multiple imitations on the platform. Haley Sacks Rich future has imitators that even use AI-generated images of women on the cover that look like the real author. These are not obscure titles. They are the best sellers. If Apple can’t keep AI knockoffs of its top books out of its store, how can indie authors or small publishers trust that theirs will be protected?
found hill His own biography was wildly inaccurate and both the author and the photograph were false.
I clicked on the author, one John Crane Miller. His biography page described him as an “experienced biographer and cultural analyst,” and his portrait was a widely used stock photograph of a white man in a suit speaking at a conference. (Mine) was one of 10 biographies Mr. Miller had published in a single week.
Between Apple Books and Amazon, there appear to be tens of thousands of fake AI books online. When Hill tracked down one of the AI bio creators, she said she could have used ChatGPT to create hers in just a few hours.
The problem isn’t limited to e-books: Amazon offers authors a print-on-demand service, meaning there is no cost to offer a paperback edition.
9to5Mac’s opinion
We’re seeing AI falling into everything from social media posts to books, and the problem is only going to get worse. For now, the best advice seems to be to read reviews carefully and read sample pages when available before purchasing.
Photo by BoliviaIntelligent in unpack
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