A Chinese old man recently fell victim to the deception of artificial intelligence by falling so in love with an AI-generated online model that he asked his wife for a divorce.
According to the Beijing Daily, a 75-year-old man named Jiang came across an AI-generated female avatar while browsing social media. To those familiar with digital avatars, the girl is obviously an AI creation, but to Jiang’s untrained eye, she is just a beautiful girl who enjoys having conversations with him. It doesn’t even matter that her speech and her moving lips are out of sync. As time goes by, he becomes so obsessed with his online girlfriend that the highlight of his day is waiting by his phone to get new generic messages from her. At one point, after his wife scolds him for spending too much time on his phone, the man tells his spouse of several decades that he wants to divorce her to fully dedicate himself to the AI avatar.
Photo: Tung Minh/Unsplash
In the end, Jiang’s children were able to bring the pensioner to his senses, explaining to him how AI works and that his internet love interest didn’t actually exist in reality. But such cases are not at all uncommon in China, where the elderly, particularly lonely ones and those with mobility issues, are increasingly becoming victims of increasingly realistic AI-generated content.
From professional-looking suit-wearing experts to realistic news anchors and cute girl students, there are different AI characters that cater to various emotional needs. Most of them are designed to promote consumption, promoting various products that many elderly people buy without hesitation, but such avatars are also used to spread propaganda and create emotional dependence.
Experts warn families with elderly relatives to closely monitor their online activity, especially if they spend too much time with gadgets. While AI technology has clear practical benefits, it can also be extremely dangerous against vulnerable targets.
