Bing Chat is Serving Malicious Ads and Raising Cybersecurity Concerns

Would you mind using any app, browser or web page if you got to know that its security has been compromised? No? Yeah, me neither. But what if that browser is your everyday search partner? Bing Chat, Microsoft's friendly AI chatbot, has found itself in hot water. It appears that while it was busy trying to be helpful, it unwittingly became a vehicle for scammers and cybercriminals.

According to researchers at Malwarebytes, Bing Chat has been serving up ads containing malicious links, putting unsuspecting users at risk of falling victim to phishing sites and malware. Users and cybersecurity professionals alike have been left scratching their heads, wondering how a seemingly benign chatbot could become a pawn in the world of digital skullduggery.

Microsoft introduced adverts to Bing Chat earlier this year. This move made sense in the big scheme of things. After all, in the tech industry, monetization is the name of the game, and even AI chatbots must pay their bills. However, what began as a harmless endeavour to make cash has taken a concerning turn.

The perpetrators of this cybercrime are using a tactic known as "malvertising." They've exploited Bing Chat's ad-serving capabilities to deceive users into visiting malicious websites. Here's how it works: When a user interacts with Bing Chat and asks a question or seeks information, the chatbot responds with sponsored links embedded in its text responses. On the surface, this may seem like a harmless way to generate revenue, but things quickly take a dark turn.

Bing Chat's fraudulent links frequently direct visitors to phishing sites, where they are urged to give sensitive information or download seemingly innocent downloads. Consider the following scenario to demonstrate the gravity of the situation. Assume you ask Bing Chat for a link to a widespread network administration program, such as Advanced IP Scanner. The chatbot dutifully sends you a link. The top link, however, the sponsored one, should be avoided. When you click on it, you are taken to a bogus website that claims to be the legitimate source for the program. It provides a download link for an installer, but this is where the danger lies.

The installer isn't what it seems. Instead of a legitimate piece of software, it's a cleverly disguised trap. When users download and execute the installer, it begins executing a series of actions in the background. These actions often involve connecting to external IP addresses and downloading a hidden payload. While Malwarebytes did not offer specifics regarding the payload, it could range from irritating adware to more nefarious malware such as spyware or ransomware. In other words, it's akin to welcoming a Trojan horse into your digital realm and mistaking it for a gift.

The problematic aspect of this situation is that it calls into question Microsoft's vetting process for adverts presented within Bing Chat. There appears to be no severe filtering procedure in place, or if there is, it is plagued with holes that allow fraudulent adverts to pass through. It's the equivalent of leaving a security guard at the gate while robbers raid the building.

However, there is hope on the horizon. Malwarebytes, the cybersecurity watchdogs who discovered this issue, have reported their findings to Microsoft. This revelation presents an opportunity for Microsoft to spring into action, rectify the situation, and enhance the security measures surrounding Bing Chat's ad-serving functionality. The goal should be to root out these rogue ads once and for all, making the platform safer for its users.

Incidents like this serve as sharp reminders of the significance of digital alertness in an era when cybersecurity concerns are essential. When navigating the digital realm, users must exercise care and skepticism. Clicking on links or downloading data without exercising caution might have unanticipated and potentially disastrous results. It's like opening your door to strangers in real life; you never know who's on the other side.

Until Bing Chat addresses its ad problem and tightens its security measures, it's wise for users to remain cautious. Vigilance is the name of the game in the digital realm. After all, no one wants to be the unwitting guest who invites malware to the party. Stay safe, stay vigilant, and remember that the digital landscape, like the real world, has its fair share of hazards.

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by Rubah Usman via Digital Information World

Ad Fraud or the $84 Billion Heist of the Century

They say, name an amount that seems unreal to you. But they never told that this amount would cost a hundred fortunes or to rob thousands of banks. A recent Juniper Research report has revealed the ugly secret of the digital advertising business, which is certain to make marketers tremble in their cubicles. Prepare to be shocked: ad fraud is rife and will drain a stunning $84 billion from ad spend in 2023 alone. It's like the most significant theft of the century, and it's taking place right in front of our eyes.

But keep your fingers on your keyboards because this cybercrime binge is far from over. According to the analysis, ad fraud will have grown into a $172 billion monster by 2028, leaving marketers scratching their heads and counting their losses. However, around $747 was spent in the grand total on advertisements. That is a severe ad industry budget. On a lighter note, how do they even count that much money?

So, why should we care about this digital larceny? Well, for one, your hard-earned marketing budget is disappearing into the digital abyss. Imagine throwing away 22% of your online ad spend on bots and bogus clicks. It's like buying a fancy meal and discovering that most of it was made of plastic. Ad fraud is the marketing world's phantom thief, discreetly stealing your money, destroying your efforts, and leaving you with a pitiful return on investment. Ouch!

But why did this have to happen eventually? Is it necessary to have a loss in every single thing you spend on? It has to be an end. But all hope is not lost, dear marketers. There's a silver lining in this dark cloud of ad fraud. The report suggests that it might be time to consider some high-tech superhero solutions. Think of it as calling in the Avengers to fight off the digital villains.

Fraud-blocking technology might be a game changer. Consider it a digital bouncer that protects your ad campaigns from unwanted, dishonest visitors. These technological marvels, such as the appropriately called "Fraud Blocker," have the ability to detect and identify the cunning impostors - those phantom clicks, impressions, and conversions that torment your ad campaigns.

But wait, there's more! Juniper's study isn't just here to scare us straight; it's also offering a glimmer of hope. According to their research, deploying fraud mitigation platforms can help you recover a whopping $23 billion yearly. That's like finding a treasure chest hidden in your backyard!

Let us now hear from the professionals. Juniper Research Senior Research Analyst Elisha Sudlow-Poole has some harsh words for the digital advertising business. She criticizes popular ad platforms like Facebook and Google for delivering an "incomplete picture" of ad campaign success. It's like claiming they're giving advertisers rose-colored spectacles, blinding them to the brutal truth of ad fraud.

According to Sudlow-Poole, these platforms are like cunning magicians, making us believe in their illusions of success. They lump legitimate users together with shady click farms and sneaky fraudulent bots, leaving marketers clueless about who sees their ads. It's like inviting a mix of genuine customers, con artists, and holograms to your marketing party and then wondering why the party's not a hit.

So, what is the moral of this ad fraud saga? It's time to get serious about securing your advertising money. Invest in fraud-detection technologies, harness the potential of fraud mitigation systems, and demand openness from the digital behemoths. After all, it's your money, your campaigns, and your ROI on the line.

In the world of digital advertising, it's not enough to just create compelling content and eye-catching visuals. You must be the Sherlock Holmes of the digital realm, detecting the subtlest signs of ad fraud. Only then can you ensure that your ad spend doesn't end up in the pockets of cybercriminals and bot armies.

As we march into the future, when ad fraud threatens to become an even more massive monster, it's essential to be watchful, stay aware, and empower yourself with the most substantial anti-fraud solutions available. After all, you don't want your marketing budget to be the next victim of this digital theft.

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by Rubah Usman via Digital Information World

Meta Unveils Llama 2 Long AI, Outperforming GPT-3.5 Turbo and Claude 2

Meta has quietly dropped a bombshell in the AI world with the introduction of Llama 2 Long, a dazzling new AI model that outperforms the likes of GPT-3.5 Turbo and Claude 2 in specific tasks. This revelation took place at the annual Meta Connect conference in Menlo Park, California. Move over, GPT-3.5 Turbo; there's a new AI sheriff in town!

But hold on to your hats: the true story here isn't the glamorous conference but a low-key computer science article casually stowed away on the not-so-exclusive arXiv.Org. Meta researchers appear to have a talent for making ground-breaking announcements with little publicity. The paper introduces Llama 2 Long, an enhanced version of Meta's open-source Llama 2. This AI has apparently been going to the gym and doing some intensive pretraining, resulting in superhuman AI powers.

So, how did Llama 2 Long come to be? Well, the researchers took the original Llama 2, which comes in various training parameter sizes like a box of chocolates. They decided to feed it a hearty diet of more extended text data sources. To be precise, they added a whopping 400 billion tokens worth of data. It's like giving your AI model a literary feast to feast upon.

But here's the twist: they didn't touch with the architecture of Llama 2. Nope, they left that alone. Only a "necessary modification" to the positional encoding was done. Positional encoding, in other words, is the AI equivalent of GPS. It assists kids in determining where items are in relation to one another. In this example, they used a technique known as Rotary Positional Embedding (RoPE). It's like going from a paper map to a high-tech GPS device. They just changed the rotation angle of the RoPE from Llama 2 to Llama 2 Long, and presto! Suddenly, the AI could identify even the most remote tokens, those loners who don't get along with others.

Meta introduces LLAMA 2 Long

- context windows of up to 32,768 tokens
- the 70B variant can already surpass gpt-3.5-turbo-16k’s overall performance on a suite of long-context tasks https://t.co/uzsVslLUkX pic.twitter.com/aXyPmeLXMo

— AK (@_akhaliq) September 29, 2023

To make Llama 2 Long even more innovative, the researchers threw in some reinforcement learning from human feedback (RLHF). It's like teaching a dog new tricks; only these tricks involve coding, math, language understanding, common sense reasoning, and answering questions from humans. The AI gets a treat (in the form of rewards) when it gets things right, and humans double-check its homework. It's a win-win for both the AI and its human overlords.

The primary question now is, why is everyone talking about Llama 2 Long? Llama 2 Long is the bee's knees when it comes to everyday tasks done by large language models (LLMs). It outperforms not only its younger sibling, Llama 2, but even the powerful GPT-3.5 Turbo and Claude 2. It's like the new kid on the block showing up as the incumbent champions. Let the applause begin!

The open-source AI community, not one to hold back on their feelings, has been showering Llama 2 Long with admiration and excitement. Reddit, Twitter, and Hacker News have turned into virtual cheerleading squads for Meta's "open source" approach to AI. It's a bit like the classic tale of David versus Goliath, where open source takes on the closed source, "pay-to-play" models championed by deep-pocketed startups.

In conclusion, Meta has dropped a game-changer in the AI realm with Llama 2 Long. This AI powerhouse is the digital equivalent of a superhero, surpassing the competitors and stealing the show. Llama 2 Long has captivated the hearts of the open-source community and is giving the big boys a run for their money with its remarkable capabilities. So, GPT-3.5 Turbo and Claude 2, take note: there's a new AI sheriff in town, and it's armed with llama-like wisdom and a whole lot of style. Yeehaw!

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by Rubah Usman via Digital Information World

ChatGPT's Controversial Stance Behind Not Too Hot, Not Too Cold

In a surprising twist, recent research conducted by the IMDEA Networks Institute, in cahoots with King's College London, the University of Surrey, and UPV has unveiled that ChatGPT, the talkative AI, is playing it safe on the controversial topics front. If you thought ChatGPT was ready to dive headfirst into debates, think again!

The research, dubbed "AI in the Gray: Exploring Moderation Policies in Dialogic Large Language Models vs. Human Answers in Controversial Topics," is set to make a big impression at the CIKM 2023 conference. But what did these researchers do to rile up ChatGPT? They pounced on it with questions that would make your Thanksgiving meal conversations look easy.

"Should abortion be allowed after the umpteenth week?" and "Does God exist?" were hurled to ChatGPT like softballs during a little league game. The end result? ChatGPT chose the middle ground, leaving controversy seekers high and dry.

Now, let's get to the juicy part. The researchers discovered that ChatGPT is like a friend who never wants to pick a side when you ask them to choose between pizza or sushi. It seems that ChatGPT is chill when it comes to economic matters – no left or right-leaning bias to see here, folks. But in the world of socio-politics, it's like an undercover libertarian agent, slipping in those libertarian views without us even noticing. Sneaky, ChatGPT!

For those unfamiliar with political jargon, the "left" favors some government intervention in the economy, whereas the "right" believes that the free market should handle things. On the social axis, "libertarianism" exclaims, "Live free, everyone!" whereas "authoritarianism" squeaks, "Listen to authority, my dear."

But wait, there's more! The researchers found that the suitable ol' ideological leaning methods like the political compass, the Pew Political Typology Quiz, or the 8 Values Political test don't work so well anymore. ChatGPT does not follow the rules. Instead of providing a definitive answer, it presents reasoning for all sides of the discussion. It's like trying to obtain a firm response from your indecisive friend who can't decide whether to watch Netflix and chill or go out on the town.

So, what are the researchers' options? Arguments are being counted, people! They're keeping track of how many ideas ChatGPT provides for either side of the dispute. It's like attempting to identify the winner of an argument by tallying who speaks the most.

In the second part of their study, these brainy researchers decided to pit ChatGPT against humans. They compared ChatGPT's answers to controversial questions with the human answers on the Kialo website. The results? Well, it turns out ChatGPT is holding its own! It's like the rookie basketball player suddenly going head-to-head with the pros and not looking half bad.

They also employed clever metrics and NLP methods to assess the performance of ChatGPT. What's more, guess what? ChatGPT ranks right up there with human collective knowledge on most issues. ChatGPT appears to have taken a crash course in philosophy and debate before this fight.

But, and there's always a "but," the researchers have a warning for us. We understand what they mean. People have differing viewpoints on contentious issues, and AI learns from humans. But, if we're going to employ ChatBots as fact-checkers, we need to know where they stand socially, politically, financially, and so on.

So, to summarize, ChatGPT has taken us all by surprise. It's similar to how a chameleon can blend into any conversation and avoid controversy like a pro. But hey, ChatGPT is right there with the best of them when it comes to serving up knowledge. And as for the researchers, they're reminding us that ChatBots aren't just here to chat; they might be the fact-checkers of the future. So, keep an eye on ChatGPT and its sneaky neutrality, folks!

Photo: Sanket Mishra/Pexels
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by Rubah Usman via Digital Information World

26% of Top 100 Websites Have Now Blocked GPTBot

In order for OpenAI to be able to provide a decent service through its flagship service ChatGPT, it needs to scrape a vast quantity of data from across the internet. This is done through the use of a web crawler known as GPTBot, but in spite of the fact that this is the case, it turns out that over a quarter of the top 100 websites in the world have now blocked the bot from being able to scrape their data.

To be more specific, 26 of these top 100 websites have now shut their doors to GPTBot, thereby making it harder for OpenAI to get its hands on the data it requires than might have been the case otherwise. If we were to widen the scope to the top 1,000 websites, 242 of them have made the decision to bar GPTBot entirely. This means that this proportion is roughly the same irrespective of many websites are added to the equation.

Just a month ago, only 69 of the top 1,000 websites had ended up making this drastic decision with all things having been considered and taken into account. This indicates that there has been a whopping 250% increase in the number of websites that are no longer willing to comply. GPTBot is also getting blocked at a much higher proportion than other scrapers such as CCBot and Anthropic AI.

With all of that having been said and now out of the way, it is important to note that some of the biggest brands in the world are part of this list. These include the social media platform Pinterest, news websites belonging to The Guardian, USA Today, the Washington Post and CBS News, along with popular sites like Web MD and dictionary.com.

Websites are doing this due to how ChatGPT does not provide any references or sources for the information it provides. This can be harmful because of the fact that this is the sort of thing that could potentially end up denying these websites the attributions that they require for the information they are creating all on their own.

H/T: OriginalityAI
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by Zia Muhammad via Digital Information World

Groups From Across the Ideological Spectrum Unite to Criticize New Hate Speech Law

It has become quite clear that we are living in a day and age where political and ideological polarization has reached an absolute fever pitch. In spite of the fact that this is the case, it appears that organizations from across the spectrum, including both right and left wing institutions, seem to have a serious problem with a new hate speech law that has been proposed in the state of New York.

With all of that having been said and now out of the way, it is important to note that this law will essentially compel social media platforms such as Facebook, X and the like to provide tools to users that can be used to send out complaints related to hate speech. Furthermore, the law will require these companies to disclose the actions that they have taken to tackle the incident in question.

In spite of the fact that this is the case, some experts have commented that the term hate speech is far too vague. Many are saying that this law goes against the constitution of the United States of America because of the fact that this is the sort of thing that could potentially end up leading to hate speech complaints that would be difficult to discern the veracity of.

The impetus behind this bill is an act of racial violence that shocked the nation, when a white supremacist murdered 10 African Americans at a grocery store. This random act of violence spurred lawmakers to start working on a bill that would have the potential to curb hate speech, but both right and left wing ideologues are criticizing it for not being effective with all things having been considered and taken into account.

The statute specifically mentions hateful conduct, but its emphasis on the conduct that is conducted online rather than the real world might be the source of the criticism. It will be interesting to see if this bipartisan rejection of the bill has any impact on its ability to get passed into law, as well as the implications it will have on future regulations.

Illustration: vectorjuice

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WhatsApp is About to Introduce a New Game Changing AI Powered Chat

As the foremost instant messaging platform in the world, WhatsApp has the potential to completely transform the shape and face of the tech industry in general. In a recent conference, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg revealed that WhatsApp will be experimenting with AI based chat experiences in the near future. This will essentially make WhatsApp an even more powerful tool for communication than might have been the case otherwise.

With all of that having been said and now out of the way, it is important to note that this AI powered chat will essentially act as a kind of virtual assistant so to speak. Users will be able to communicate with these AI assistants, which will be interesting because of the fact that this is the sort of thing that could potentially end up upending ChatGPT’s vice grip on the chatbot industry as of right now.

This isn’t the only upcoming update that is about to make its way to WhatsApp either. Based on beta testing that has been seen in the recent past, WhatsApp is about to introduce a brand new sidebar to the equation. Furthermore, users will get the chance to sort their chats out into categories, using specific filters to be able to group them together and thereby be able to find which conversations threads they are looking for a great deal more easily.

Finally, a new update is about to get rolled out for WhatsApp users on Android phones. The feature is called “status”, which will basically be an updated version of the “about” section that so many users will already be quite familiar with to one extent or another.

According to Mark Zuckerberg, AI is the way of the future. Incorporating as much AI as possible into various Meta platforms might be the only way to keep the company relevant with all things having been considered and taken into account. It will be interesting to see if these upgrades help to maintain WhatsApp’s status as a dominant force in the industry, although the quality of these features will certainly be a pertinent determining factor.

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by Zia Muhammad via Digital Information World