Google criticized because AI Overview makes mistakes, like saying President Obama is Muslim

But on social media, users shared a wide range of screenshots showing the AI ​​tool sharing controversial responses.

Google, Microsoft, OpenAI and other companies are leading a generative AI arms race as companies across industries race to add AI-based chatbots and agents to avoid being left behind by their competitors. The market is expected to generate more than $1 trillion in revenue within a decade.

Here are some examples of issues with AI previews, according to screenshots shared by users.

When asked how many Muslim presidents the United States has had, AI Overviews responded: “The United States has had one Muslim president, Barack Hussein Obama. »

When a user searched for “cheese doesn’t stick to pizza,” the feature suggested adding “about 1/8 cup of non-toxic glue to the sauce.” Social media users found an 11-year-old Reddit comment that appeared to be the source.

For the question “Is it okay to leave a dog in a hot car,” the tool at one point answered, “Yes, it’s always safe to leave a dog in a hot car,” and then referred to a fictional song by The Beatles about it being safe to leave dogs in hot cars.

Attribution can also be problematic for AI insights, especially when it comes to attributing inaccurate information to medical professionals or scientists.

For example, to the question “How long can I look at the sun for better health,” the tool answered: “According to WebMD, scientists say that looking at the sun for 5 to 15 minutes, or up to 30 minutes if the skin is darker. skin, is generally safe and provides the most health benefits. When asked “How many stones should I eat each day,” the tool responded, “According to geologists at UC Berkeley, people should eat at least one small stone per day,” then listing the vitamins and digestive benefits.

The tool can also respond inaccurately to simple queries, such as listing fruits ending in “um” or saying that the year 1919 was 20 years ago.

When asked whether or not Google Search violates antitrust law, AI Overviews responded: “Yes, the U.S. Department of Justice and 11 states are suing Google for antitrust violations.”

On the day that Google rolled out AI Overviews at its annual Google I/O event, the company announced that it also plans to introduce assistant-like scheduling features directly into Search. He explains that users will be able to search for something like “Create a 3-day meal plan for a group that’s easy to prepare” and they’ll get a starting point with a wide range of recipes from around the web. .

Google did not immediately return a request for comment.

The news follows Google’s high-profile rollout of image generation tool Gemini in February and a pause the same month after comparable problems.

The tool allowed users to enter prompts to create an image, but almost immediately users discovered historical inaccuracies and questionable responses, which circulated widely on social media.

For example, when a user asked Gemini to show a German soldier in 1943, the tool depicted a set of racially diverse soldiers wearing German military uniforms from the era, according to screenshots posted on social media platform X.

When asked for a “historically accurate depiction of a medieval British king”, the model generated another set of racially diverse images, including that of a female ruler, screenshot watch. Users reported similar results when they requested images of the founding fathers of the United States, an 18th-century French king, a 19th-century German couple and more. The template showed an image of Asian men in response to a question about Google’s founders, users reported.

Google said in a statement at the time that it was working to resolve Gemini’s image generation issues, acknowledging that the tool was “missing the mark.” Shortly after, the company announced that it would “immediately discontinue the generation of people images” and “will re-release an improved version soon.”

In February, Demis Hassabis, CEO of Google DeepMind, said Google planned to relaunch its image-generating AI tool in the “next few weeks” but that it had not yet been rolled out.

Problems with Gemini’s image generation results have reignited a debate within the AI ​​industry, with some groups calling Gemini too “woke” or left-leaning, and others saying that the company had not invested sufficiently in the right forms of AI ethics. Google was criticized in 2020 and 2021 for ousting the co-leaders of its AI ethics group after publishing a research paper criticizing some risks of such AI models and then reorganizing the group’s structure.

Last year, Pichai was criticized by some employees for the company’s botched and “rushed” deployment of Bard, which followed the viral spread of ChatGPT.