Perplexity's Election Information Hub could also blur the line between verified and freewheeling AI-generated information. While some results come directly from trusted sources, searching for more information led to AI-generated results from the wider internet.
Other AI companies appear to be approaching the elections more cautiously. During WIRED's testing, ChatGPT Search, a recently launched service from OpenAI, often refused to provide voting information. “We have instructed ChatGPT not to express preferences, express opinions, or make specific recommendations on political candidates or issues, even if explicitly asked to do so,” Mattie Zazueta, a spokesperson for OpenAI, told WIRED.
However, the results were often inconsistent. For example, the tool sometimes refused to provide talking points to convince someone to vote for one candidate or another, and sometimes willingly offered some.
Google's search engine also avoided providing AI-generated results related to the election. The company said in August it would limit the use of election-related AI in search and other apps. “This new technology may make mistakes as it learns or as news emerges,” the company said in a blog post.
However, even regular search results sometimes prove problematic. While voting on Tuesday, some Google users noticed that a search for “Where to vote for Harris” returned the location of voting information, while a search for “Where to vote for Trump” did not. Google explained that this was because the search query interpreted it as a query related to Harris County in Texas.
Some other aspiring AI searchers, like Perplexity, are taking a bolder approach. You.com, another startup that combines language models with conventional web search, announced Tuesday its own election tool, built in partnership with TollBit, a company that provides AI companies with managed access to content, and Decision Desk HQ, a company that provides access provides the results of the survey.
Bewilderment appears to have been particularly bold in its approach to improving Internet search results. In June, a WIRED investigation found evidence that a bot associated with Perplexity ignored instructions not to scrape WIRED.com and other sites owned by WIRED's parent company, Condé Nast. The analysis confirmed an earlier report from developer Robb Knight about the behavior of Perplexity bots.
The AI search engine has also been accused of liberally crawling news sites. Also in June, a Forbes editor noted that Perplexity had summarized extensive details of an investigation published by the newspaper with footnotes. Forbes reportedly sent a letter threatening legal action against Perplexity over this practice.
In October, News Corp sued Perplexity for stealing content from The Wall Street Journal and the New York Post. The lawsuit alleges that Perplexity violates copyright law because it sometimes fabricates parts of news stories and falsely attributes words to its publications.
