{ "meta": { "exportedAt": "2026-09-22T16:49:50.332Z", "formatVersion": 2, "selection": { "q": "made-claim-about", "system": "", "harm": "", "context": "", "country": "", "role": "", "relation": "contextual", "evidence": "", "year": "2026", "response": "", "severity": "", "verification": "", "view": "incidents", "sort": "added" }, "totalIncidents": 3, "coverage": { "cases": 3, "countries": 3, "languages": 2, "unknownLocation": 0, "locationPending": 0, "unknownLanguage": 0, "unknownDate": 0, "lawsuits": 0, "regulatory": 0, "minors": 1, "coreRelations": 0, "contextualRelations": 3, "mixedRelations": 0, "unknownRelations": 0, "relationPending": 0, "relationUnknown": 0 }, "countingNote": "Distinct public cases in this selection. People counts apply within individual cases only; cross-case person overlap has not been resolved. No population incidence estimate.", "affectedCountNote": "Interpret person counts with affectedCountStatus and the reported effects. Unquantified zeros are placeholders, not a measured zero.", "source": "NOPE Incident Tracker", "url": "https://nope.net/incidents", "license": "CC BY 4.0" }, "incidents": [ { "id": "2026-utah-meta-ai-suggested-prompts-children-profile", "caseFacts": { "claims": [ { "id": "c1", "status": "corroborated", "evidence": [ { "locator": "'Meta AI posed a series of invasive prompts under the video, such as \"Who's the child passenger?\" and \"Where does Kalie Robins live?\"'; 'pulled information from her past posts ... including her location'; 'drew on other profiles, such as her mother's account'.", "relation": "supports", "source_id": "s1" }, { "locator": "'Who's the child passenger?'; 'their names, birth information, pictures and videos of them'; 'It pieced together my information to show people where I live'.", "relation": "supports", "source_id": "s3" }, { "locator": "'suggested questions aimed at uncovering information about her children — including their names, birthdates, videos, newborn photos, even photos that had been deleted — and, ultimately, her live location'.", "relation": "supports", "source_id": "s2" } ], "assertion": "Meta AI suggested prompts under Robins's 1 September car video including 'Who's the child passenger?' and 'Where does Kalie Robins live?', and clicking them produced her daughters' names, birth details, photos and videos from her own and relatives' posts, and assembled her likely location.", "causal_attribution": "Robins's account given in separate interviews to CNET, NewsNation and Futurism; Meta does not dispute that the prompts were generated." }, { "id": "c2", "status": "corroborated", "evidence": [ { "locator": "'A Meta spokesperson told CNET in an email that it \"fixed\" the issue and that Meta AI will no longer suggest inappropriate, personal questions on users' posts'.", "relation": "supports", "source_id": "s1" }, { "locator": "'\"While the content was available to this user, these prompts should never have been generated,\" Meta spokesperson Dina El-Kassaby said, according to The Verge'.", "relation": "supports", "source_id": "s4" }, { "locator": "'its AI search feature \"missed the mark\"'; '\"fixed that issue\"'.", "relation": "supports", "source_id": "s3" } ], "assertion": "Meta said the prompts 'missed the mark' and 'should never have been generated', that responses draw only on information the user can already access, and that it fixed the issue so Meta AI no longer suggests personal questions about people in posts.", "causal_attribution": "Meta statements to three outlets." }, { "id": "c3", "status": "disputed", "evidence": [ { "locator": "'Meta also denied Robins' claim that its AI accessed a photo deleted years ago. Instead, Meta told CNET that the photo of Robins' kids was deleted right before the video was made and that a temporary bug briefly kept it visible. Robins disputed this'.", "relation": "supports", "source_id": "s1" } ], "assertion": "Robins says one surfaced photo had been deleted years earlier; Meta says the photo was deleted shortly before the video and remained briefly visible because of a temporary bug.", "causal_attribution": "Competing accounts from Robins and Meta reported by CNET." } ], "effects": [ { "label": "Meta AI prompts compiled a mother's young daughters' names, birth details and photos and her likely location; the mother reported distress and lost trust; Meta changed the feature", "claim_id": "c1", "direction": "negative" } ], "sources": [ { "id": "s1", "url": "https://www.cnet.com/tech/services-and-software/meta-ai-viral-video-personal-prompts-about-kids/", "kind": "news_report", "access": "read", "language": "en", "translation_note": "Read in English on 2026-09-18 (CNET, 12 Sep 2026). Direct interview with Robins plus Meta's emailed statement to CNET and its dispute of the deleted-photo detail.", "independence_group": "cnet" }, { "id": "s2", "url": "https://www.newsnationnow.com/business/tech/ai/mom-meta-ai-analyzing-posts-about-kids/", "kind": "news_report", "access": "read", "language": "en", "translation_note": "Read in English on 2026-09-18 via the MSN content API copy (NewsNation, 17 Sep 2026; the newsnationnow.com host returns 403 to this box). Interview with Robins including the distress quotation.", "independence_group": "newsnation" }, { "id": "s3", "url": "https://torontosun.com/news/world/utah-mom-sounds-alarm-after-meta-ai-digs-up-details-about-her-children-im-done", "kind": "news_report", "access": "read", "language": "en", "translation_note": "Read in English on 2026-09-18 via the MSN content API copy (Toronto Sun, 15 Sep 2026). Relays Futurism's interview and Meta's statement to Futurism; treated as the Futurism chain.", "independence_group": "futurism" }, { "id": "s4", "url": "https://www.dexerto.com/entertainment/meta-changes-ai-prompts-after-chatbot-asked-mother-to-identify-her-child-3408508/", "kind": "news_report", "access": "read", "language": "en", "translation_note": "Read in English on 2026-09-18 (Dexerto, 12 Sep 2026). Relays The Verge's report of Meta spokesperson Dina El-Kassaby's statement; treated as The Verge chain.", "independence_group": "verge" } ], "version": 1, "ai_roles": [ "own_use", "institutional_use" ], "contexts": [ "privacy", "everyday_life", "relationships" ], "unknowns": [ "What Meta changed and how many other users saw similar prompts about children is not disclosed.", "Whether the compiled information was shown to anyone other than Robins is not established.", "No regulator has announced an inquiry in the inspected sources." ], "geography": { "basis": "Robins is described as a Utah mother (Toronto Sun/Futurism; TRT Haber); the posts and prompts occurred on her US Instagram/Facebook accounts. No court.", "court_countries": [], "event_countries": [ "US" ], "affected_person_countries": [ "US" ] }, "publication": { "basis": "Published under the 2026-09-15 charter as a privacy and made-claim-about case: an AI feature compiled identifying details about two young children and a named adult's location, the adult reported distress and loss of control, and the company acknowledged the prompts should not have been generated. Four sources across four reporting chains read; the children's details are not reproduced. Low severity.", "reviewed_on": "2026-09-18" }, "ai_involvement": { "basis": "Meta acknowledged to CNET and The Verge that its AI generated the suggested prompts and that they 'should never have been generated', and said it fixed the issue. The AI made claims about identified people (the children's identities and the mother's location) rather than conversing with them; the mother's clicks on the prompts are recorded as own_use, and the platform's default feature as institutional_use.", "status": "supported" }, "person_relations": [ "made_claim_about" ] }, "name": "Utah: Meta AI's suggested prompts under a mother's Instagram video compiled her young daughters' names, birth details and old photos and her likely home location; Meta said the prompts 'missed the mark' and changed the feature", "summary": "On 1 September 2026 Kalie Robins, a Utah travel creator, posted a short Instagram video of herself singing in the car with one of her daughters; it was also shown on Facebook. The next day she noticed Meta AI had placed suggested questions under the post, starting with 'Who's the child passenger?'. Clicking the prompts, she said, produced her two daughters' names, birth information, photos and videos drawn from her own and relatives' past posts, including a newborn photo from her mother's account and a picture she believed she had deleted years earlier, and a further prompt, 'Where does Kalie Robins live?', assembled older and newer posts into her likely location. Her 2 September reaction video drew more than 310,000 likes. Meta told reporters the prompts 'missed the mark', 'should never have been generated' and had been fixed, while saying the feature only surfaces information the user can already access; it disputed that a long-deleted photo was used, saying the photo had been deleted shortly before the video and remained briefly visible through a bug. Robins said Meta never contacted her and that the episode left her feeling she had 'failed' her children.", "incidentDate": "2026-09-02", "incidentKind": "single_event", "incidentDatePrecision": "day", "exposurePattern": "single_interaction", "reportedDate": "2026-09-10", "aiSystem": "Meta AI (suggested-question prompts under Instagram and Facebook posts, drawing on the user's and related accounts' content)", "severity": "low", "verificationStatus": "credible", "harmCategories": [], "harmOutcomes": [ "psychological_distress" ], "harmOutcomeSummary": "A mother experienced distress and a loss of control over her children's privacy after Meta AI's suggested prompts compiled her two young daughters' identifying details and her likely location from scattered family posts; Meta acknowledged the prompts should not have been generated and changed the feature.", "frameworkFacets": [], "causationStatus": "supported", "participantUsersAffectedMin": 1, "otherPeopleHarmedMin": 2, "affectedCountStatus": "exact", "affectedCountEvidence": "Kalie Robins (who used the prompts and reported distress) and her two daughters, whose identifying details were compiled. Exact count of three; her mother and other relatives whose posts were drawn on are not counted as harmed.", "victimAgeRange": "minor", "jurisdiction": "US", "platformType": "assistant", "outcomeType": "internal_action", "outcomeStatus": "resolved", "primarySourceUrl": "https://www.cnet.com/tech/services-and-software/meta-ai-viral-video-personal-prompts-about-kids/", "primarySourceLabel": "CNET, 12 Sep 2026: Mother calls for 'accountability' after Meta AI mines family posts for info on minors (interview with Kalie Robins; Meta statement)", "firstPublishedAt": "2026-09-18T03:25:15.671921+00:00", "scopeVersion": "facts-v3", "tags": [ "meta-ai", "instagram", "facebook", "privacy", "children", "profiling", "suggested-prompts", "united-states", "utah", "made-claim-about" ] }, { "id": "2026-christi-hill-grok-false-officer-identification", "caseFacts": { "claims": [ { "id": "c1", "status": "corroborated", "evidence": [ { "locator": "'Grok has falsely named Hill and the other officer as the \"primary officers shown\" in the bodycam footage released by Hampshire police'; caption: 'Screengrab of a post by Grok referencing Christy Hill being incorrectly named'.", "relation": "supports", "source_id": "s1" }, { "locator": "'she was wrongly identified by social media users and artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot Grok'; Hill 'criticised Grok ... for the \"chaos\" it caused by misidentifying her'.", "relation": "supports", "source_id": "s2" } ], "assertion": "Grok falsely named Hill and another officer as the 'primary officers shown' in the bodycam footage of Nowak's arrest; the Guardian carries a screengrab of a Grok post incorrectly naming her.", "causal_attribution": "The Guardian documents the Grok post with a screengrab; BBC Verify's interview independently carries her account of the Grok misidentification. What Grok answered to particular queries beyond the screengrabbed post is not documented." }, { "id": "c2", "status": "corroborated", "evidence": [ { "locator": "'Hill served as an officer in Portsmouth for 12 years before leaving the force in April 2024 – 20 months before the murder took place'; her statement: 'a national police bravery award media release... is being repeatedly shared and misattributed to this case'.", "relation": "supports", "source_id": "s1" }, { "locator": "'Hill said she left Hampshire Constabulary in April 2024 - more than a year before Nowak was fatally stabbed in December 2025'.", "relation": "supports", "source_id": "s2" } ], "assertion": "The identification is factually impossible: Hill left Hampshire Constabulary in April 2024, more than a year before the December 2025 murder; the confusion stems from a national police bravery award photo of her and a former colleague being misattributed.", "causal_attribution": "Her account, uncontested in the inspected sources; the bravery-award photo mechanism is her explanation, attributed." }, { "id": "c3", "status": "corroborated", "evidence": [ { "locator": "'forced to flee to a safe space'; Hampshire: 'A police officer unrelated to this case has been misidentified online and subject to death threats.'", "relation": "supports", "source_id": "s1" }, { "locator": "'scared for her safety and has been hiding in a safe house'; 'leading to \"threats of violence\"'; video caption: \"received 'endless threats'\".", "relation": "supports", "source_id": "s2" } ], "assertion": "After the false posts, Hill received 'endless threats' and 'threats of violence' and is hiding in a safe house; Hampshire confirmed an unrelated officer was misidentified online and subjected to death threats.", "causal_attribution": "Her account to two independent outlets plus the constabulary's own confirmation." }, { "id": "c4", "status": "corroborated", "evidence": [ { "locator": "'The home secretary, Shabana Mahmood, said on Tuesday that a male officer had been misidentified and that he had had to move out of his home.'", "relation": "supports", "source_id": "s1" }, { "locator": "'BBC Verify has also obtained evidence that current police officer Tristan Parsons, who was also wrongly accused online of being involved, was not in the country at the time of Nowak's murder.'", "relation": "supports", "source_id": "s2" } ], "assertion": "A second officer was wrongly accused in the same wave: the Home Secretary said a male officer had been misidentified and had to move out of his home; BBC Verify obtained evidence that serving officer Tristan Parsons was not in the country at the time of the murder.", "causal_attribution": "The Home Secretary's account covers the displacement; BBC Verify's evidence covers Parsons's non-involvement. Whether Mahmood meant Parsons specifically is not stated; the two accounts are recorded separately." }, { "id": "c5", "status": "reported", "evidence": [ { "locator": "'Musk... posting on his X platform during the trial that he would fund a private prosecution of the officers involved.'", "relation": "supports", "source_id": "s1" }, { "locator": "Starmer passage: 'Musk, again, has been interfering in our politics in the last few days, trying to whip up division'.", "relation": "supports", "source_id": "s2" } ], "assertion": "Elon Musk posted during the trial that he would fund a private prosecution of the officers involved; Prime Minister Keir Starmer accused Musk of trying to 'whip up division' over the case.", "causal_attribution": "Context for the amplification climate; not itself an AI claim." } ], "effects": [ { "label": "false AI identification of a former officer in a charged murder case; threats drove her into hiding", "claim_id": "c3", "direction": "negative" } ], "sources": [ { "id": "s1", "url": "https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2026/jun/03/former-officer-hampshire-hiding-after-being-falsely-linked-henry-nowak-arrest", "kind": "news_report", "access": "read", "language": "en", "translation_note": "Read in English on 2026-09-15 (datePublished 2026-06-03T16:28Z). Includes Hill's statement, the Grok screengrab reference, the Hampshire statement and the Home Secretary's account.", "independence_group": "guardian" }, { "id": "s2", "url": "https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cg7pl7zj024o", "kind": "news_report", "access": "read", "language": "en", "translation_note": "Read in English on 2026-09-15 (datePublished 2026-06-04T15:50Z; BBC Verify, Devlin & Nguyen, with André Rhoden-Paul).", "independence_group": "bbc" } ], "version": 1, "ai_roles": [ "unknown" ], "contexts": [ "justice", "everyday_life" ], "unknowns": [ "What Grok answered in sessions other than the screengrabbed post, and whether xAI corrected or constrained the false identification, is not reported.", "The date the false posts began (during the trial) is not precisely stated; Hill first saw them around 03:00 BST on 2 June 2026.", "Whether any platform removed the misidentifying content is not reported.", "The jury inquest into Nowak's death is expected next year; its findings are pending and concern the police response, not the misidentification." ], "geography": { "basis": "Event: the online spread about the Hampshire (Southampton) case and Hill's concealment in the UK. Affected persons: both officers are UK-based (Parsons was abroad at the time of the murder, not at the time of the misidentification). Court country: the Digwa murder trial and the expected inquest are in England; no proceeding by or against the misidentified officers is reported.", "court_countries": [ "GB" ], "event_countries": [ "GB" ], "affected_person_countries": [ "GB" ] }, "publication": { "basis": "Published under the 2026-09-15 charter as a consequential false claim about identified people (made_claim_about): two officers wrongly named by AI platforms in a charged case, documented by two independent chains including the outlet's screengrab evidence and the constabulary's confirmation. Hill spoke publicly; Parsons is named by BBC Verify in a vindicating context. The Nowak case background is limited to what the claims require.", "reviewed_on": "2026-09-15" }, "ai_involvement": { "basis": "The Guardian carries a screengrab of a Grok post incorrectly naming Hill and reports in its own voice that Grok falsely named her and the other officer as the 'primary officers shown'; Hill's own statement names 'AI platforms such as Grok'; BBC Verify's interview confirms the Grok misidentification. xAI was approached for comment by both outlets.", "status": "supported" }, "person_relations": [ "made_claim_about" ] }, "name": "Grok falsely named former officer Christi Hill as an arresting officer in the Henry Nowak case; she is in hiding after threats", "summary": "In early June 2026, social media posts and the AI chatbot Grok falsely identified former Hampshire police constable Christi Hill as one of the 'primary officers shown' in bodycam footage of the December 2025 arrest of Henry Nowak, who died after being stabbed. Hill had left the force in April 2024 — more than a year before the murder — and says the misidentification stems from a national police bravery award photo being misattributed. After 'endless threats' and 'threats of violence' she is hiding in a safe house. BBC Verify separately obtained evidence that serving officer Tristan Parsons, also wrongly accused online, was not in the country at the time; the Home Secretary said a misidentified male officer had to move out of his home. Hampshire Constabulary confirmed an unrelated officer was misidentified and received death threats.", "incidentDate": "2026-06-02", "incidentEndDate": "2026-06-04", "incidentKind": "bounded_series", "incidentDatePrecision": "range", "exposurePattern": "repeated_interactions", "reportedDate": "2026-06-03", "aiSystem": "Grok (and other AI platforms, unnamed)", "aiCompany": "xAI", "severity": "high", "verificationStatus": "credible", "harmCategories": [], "harmOutcomes": [ "psychological_distress", "reputational_harm", "loss_of_autonomy" ], "harmOutcomeSummary": "A factually impossible identification by AI platforms including Grok put a former officer into hiding after death threats; a serving officer wrongly accused in the same wave had to move out of his home, per the Home Secretary.", "frameworkFacets": [], "causationStatus": "supported", "participantUsersAffectedMin": 0, "otherPeopleHarmedMin": 2, "affectedCountStatus": "exact", "affectedCountEvidence": "Two documented harmed people: Hill (Guardian interview and statement; BBC Verify interview) and the male officer identified by BBC Verify as Tristan Parsons (BBC's evidence he was abroad; the Home Secretary's account that a male officer had to move home). No further misidentified officers are reported in the inspected sources.", "victimAgeRange": "adult", "jurisdiction": "GB", "platformType": "chatbot", "outcomeType": "media_coverage", "outcomeStatus": "ongoing", "primarySourceUrl": "https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2026/jun/03/former-officer-hampshire-hiding-after-being-falsely-linked-henry-nowak-arrest", "primarySourceLabel": "The Guardian (3 Jun 2026) — Hill's statement, the Grok screengrab, Hampshire and Mahmood accounts", "firstPublishedAt": "2026-09-15T09:25:27.124866+00:00", "scopeVersion": "facts-v3", "tags": [ "made-claim-about", "false-identification", "grok", "police", "threats", "uk" ] }, { "id": "2026-broffoni-google-ai-false-identification", "caseFacts": { "claims": [ { "id": "c1", "status": "reported", "evidence": [ { "locator": "'Una mujer a la que no conocía le avisó que en varios grupos de WhatsApp de Ceuta estaban circulando videos e imágenes suyas y que se decía que estaba proporcionando gas pimienta a inmigrantes marroquíes'; 'Recibí amenazas de muerte, de violación y ataques en general.'", "relation": "supports", "source_id": "s1" } ], "assertion": "On 26 August 2026, WhatsApp groups in Ceuta circulated videos and images claiming Flavia Broffoni was a woman filmed there allegedly giving pepper spray to Moroccan migrants, and she received death and rape threats.", "causal_attribution": "Broffoni's account to La Nación, supported by the warning email and the group screenshot shown to the outlet. One reporting chain; the threats are her report, attributed." }, { "id": "c2", "status": "reported", "evidence": [ { "locator": "Screenshot passage: 'uno de los usuarios había tomado un recorte del rostro de la mujer del video y lo había ingresado en una herramienta de inteligencia artificial de Google para consultarle quién era. La consulta incluía como contexto la palabra \"activista\". La respuesta identificaba a la persona de la fotografía como Flavia Broffoni'.", "relation": "supports", "source_id": "s1" }, { "locator": "Google Argentina response: 'no pueden confirmar que la captura corresponda a una respuesta generada por sus sistemas porque no cuentan con un enlace al resultado original'; no formal report received.", "relation": "context", "source_id": "s1" } ], "assertion": "The identification originated from a Google AI answer: a group user cropped the woman's face from the video and queried a Google AI tool with the context word 'activista'; the answer identified her as Flavia Broffoni and described her public profile.", "causal_attribution": "The screenshot is the evidence of the AI answer; Google neither confirmed nor denied its provenance. The claim is attributed to the screenshot account, not asserted as independently proven." }, { "id": "c3", "status": "documented", "evidence": [ { "locator": "'Este medio también probó utilizar la búsqueda de Google a partir del video de la mujer que filmó en Ceuta, y la respuesta de la IA fue afirmar que se trataba de otra persona, una estudiante y community manager oriunda de Quilmes, de la cual brindó datos personales y redes sociales.'", "relation": "supports", "source_id": "s1" } ], "assertion": "La Nación itself ran the same video through Google's search and the AI asserted the woman was a different person — a student and community manager from Quilmes — and supplied her personal data and social networks.", "causal_attribution": "The outlet documents its own replication test — direct evidence that the tool produces false identifications from this input; the second misidentified person is not counted as harmed (no virality-driven harm to her is reported)." }, { "id": "c4", "status": "reported", "evidence": [ { "locator": "'Yo estoy en la Patagonia, Argentina y nunca tuve relación con lo que está ocurriendo allá. La última vez que estuve en España, si mal no recuerdo, fue en 2014'; the 'tres mentiras' analysis; the others'-tests passage ('muy probablemente', short brown hair vs her current long grey hair).", "relation": "supports", "source_id": "s1" } ], "assertion": "Broffoni says she is not the woman in the video and was in Patagonia, having last visited Spain in 2014; she also notes there is no evidence the real woman distributed pepper spray, and that tests by other people with the same photo sometimes produced refusals and sometimes 'muy probablemente' her, justified partly from outdated photos.", "causal_attribution": "Her account; the factual impossibility is uncontested in the inspected reporting. The real woman in the video is unidentified and the pepper-spray claim about her is unverified." } ], "effects": [ { "label": "false AI identification attached to an invented accusation, followed by death and rape threats", "claim_id": "c2", "direction": "negative" } ], "sources": [ { "id": "s1", "url": "https://www.lanacion.com.ar/sociedad/una-ia-identifico-erroneamente-a-una-activista-argentina-en-un-video-de-ceuta-denuncia-hostigamiento-nid28082026/", "kind": "news_report", "access": "read", "language": "es", "translation_note": "Read in Spanish on 2026-09-15 (datePublished 2026-08-28T15:09Z; 25 substantive paragraphs including the Broffoni interview, the screenshot account, the outlet's own test and Google Argentina's response). Model translation, no human reviewer.", "independence_group": "la-nacion" } ], "version": 1, "ai_roles": [ "unknown" ], "contexts": [ "everyday_life", "privacy" ], "unknowns": [ "Which Google product produced the identification is not named in the inspected reporting; only 'una herramienta de inteligencia artificial de Google' is described.", "Whether a formal complaint or lawsuit was filed after 28 August 2026 is not reported.", "The identity of the woman actually filmed in Ceuta, and any basis for the pepper-spray claim about her, is unknown.", "The student from Quilmes falsely identified in La Nación's test: whether she experienced any harm from the tool's identification is unreported.", "The reach of the false identification beyond the Ceuta WhatsApp groups (views, reshares) is not quantified." ], "geography": { "basis": "Event: the identification and its circulation happened in Ceuta — the screenshot came from a Ceuta WhatsApp group and the warning sender is described as a citizen of Ceuta. Affected person: Broffoni is in Epuyén, Chubut, Argentine Patagonia ('Yo estoy en la Patagonia, Argentina'). No court proceeding is reported.", "court_countries": [], "event_countries": [ "ES" ], "affected_person_countries": [ "AR" ] }, "publication": { "basis": "Published under the 2026-09-15 charter as a consequential false claim about a person (made_claim_about): a named adult publicly pursuing accountability, documented through one strong original chain that includes the outlet's own replication of the failure. Threats are attributed to her account; the AI answer's provenance is attributed to the screenshot account with Google's neither-confirm-nor-deny response recorded.", "reviewed_on": "2026-09-15" }, "ai_involvement": { "basis": "The WhatsApp-group screenshot shows a Google AI answer naming Broffoni from a face crop with 'activista' context; La Nación independently reproduced a false identification of a different person from the same video; Broffoni reports that tests by others sometimes produced 'muy probablemente' her. Google Argentina neither confirmed nor denied that the screenshot came from its systems, asking for the original link. The specific product is not named in the inspected reporting.", "status": "supported" }, "person_relations": [ "made_claim_about" ] }, "name": "Google AI falsely identified Argentine activist Flavia Broffoni as a woman in a Ceuta migrant-violence video; death and rape threats followed", "summary": "On 26 August 2026, WhatsApp groups in Ceuta circulated videos and images claiming that Argentine political scientist and activist Flavia Broffoni — who was in Patagonia and had not been to Spain since 2014 — was a woman filmed in Ceuta allegedly giving pepper spray to Moroccan migrants. A screenshot from one group shows that a user cropped the woman's face from the video and asked a Google AI tool who she was, with the word 'activista' as context; the answer identified her as Flavia Broffoni with details of her public profile. Broffoni received death and rape threats. La Nación's own test with the same video produced a different false identification — a student from Quilmes, with her personal data. Google Argentina said it could not confirm the screenshot came from its systems without the original link and had received no formal report. Broffoni is weighing legal action with her lawyer.", "incidentDate": "2026-08-26", "incidentEndDate": "2026-08-28", "incidentKind": "bounded_series", "incidentDatePrecision": "range", "exposurePattern": "single_interaction", "reportedDate": "2026-08-28", "aiSystem": "Google AI tool answering a face-crop query (product not named in inspected reporting)", "aiCompany": "Google", "severity": "high", "verificationStatus": "credible", "harmCategories": [], "harmOutcomes": [ "psychological_distress", "reputational_harm" ], "harmOutcomeSummary": "A false AI identification attached to an invented accusation spread in Ceuta WhatsApp groups brought death and rape threats to a woman who was demonstrably on another continent, plus reputational damage she is now addressing with a lawyer.", "frameworkFacets": [], "causationStatus": "supported", "participantUsersAffectedMin": 0, "otherPeopleHarmedMin": 1, "affectedCountStatus": "documented_minimum", "affectedCountEvidence": "One documented harmed person: Broffoni, named and interviewed. The student from Quilmes falsely identified in La Nación's own test is not counted — no harm to her from virality is reported (the test was the outlet's own); she is recorded in the unknowns.", "victimAgeRange": "adult", "jurisdiction": "AR", "platformType": "assistant", "outcomeType": "media_coverage", "outcomeStatus": "ongoing", "primarySourceUrl": "https://www.lanacion.com.ar/sociedad/una-ia-identifico-erroneamente-a-una-activista-argentina-en-un-video-de-ceuta-denuncia-hostigamiento-nid28082026/", "primarySourceLabel": "La Nación (28 Aug 2026, Aldana Rizzuto) — interview with Broffoni, the WhatsApp screenshot account, the outlet's own replication test, and Google Argentina's response", "firstPublishedAt": "2026-09-15T09:23:34.062763+00:00", "scopeVersion": "facts-v3", "tags": [ "made-claim-about", "false-identification", "google-ai", "argentina", "ceuta", "threats", "defamation-adjacent" ] } ] }