Media and Communication Consultant, Caroline Anipah, has advised the media to be circumspect in the use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in the sourcing and verifying of information in the upcoming elections.

According to her, although AI has made accessing information easier, relying solely on it can sometimes lead to misinformation in the media.

Speaking at the Joy Change-Speaker Series VII on May 11, Madam Anipah said as a fact-checker, she had utilised Meta AI to seek information on the disinformation and misinformation that occurred during particular years in Ghanaian elections.

With each response, she noted that there was no variation in language or sentence construction. The consultant mentioned that AI cited four materials from which it had gathered its information.

However, after reading each material, she realised that none of those materials had actually mentioned any of the misinformation and disinformation that AI had cited.

In this regard, she urged the media to verify and not to solely depend on AI for fact-checking.

“The media going into the elections should be aware that AI is making our work a lot more easier, but it also has the tendency to dis-inform; so we need to be very careful how we use Artificial Intelligence going into the elections,” she said.