ChatGPT Answers 54% of Queries Without Search, Challenging Google’s Model

According to an analysis of 80 million clickstream of global data by Semrush, websites related to software development, technology and education saw an increase in referral traffic from ChatGPT in the second half of 2024. ChatGPT also sent traffic to about 30,000 unique domains by November 2024. The analysis also found that ChatGPT also changed how people search, with answering 54% of the queries without search on and 46% queries which involved search. On average, the prompts by ChatGPT were 23 words long, with the highest reaching up to 2712 words. The search length of ChatGPT on average was just 4.2 words and the highest reaching 301 words.

The shift in search intent on ChatGPT was clear as traditional search engines only categorise keywords in informational, commercial, navigational and transactional types. But on the other hand, only 30% of the ChatGPT prompts fit into those categories, which means that 70% of ChatGPT prompts are unique and are not typically seen on classic search engines like Bing or Google.

The analysis also found that ChatGPT is giving more referral traffic to different sites other than Google like tech or AI-related platforms and OpenAI related domains. The referral traffic ChatGPT is giving sites other than Bing are education, research and technical resources as well as academic publishers. Semrush also found that ChatGPT got 566 million worldwide users in December 2024 while Google got 6.5 billion worldwide users within the same time period. It was also found that most ChatGPT users are younger males and ChatGPT is a favorite site for students while Google receives more full-time workers, retirees and homemakers.

The author of the report, Brenna Kelly, says that content creators and marketers have to keep up with all these changes in search markets and should focus on things other than traditional SEO. Brands need to work on making content that can be sites by large language models like ChatGPT so their website can get more visitors.

Review the charts below for deeper insights.

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• How Much Are Scams Really Costing You? The Numbers Are Shocking
by Arooj Ahmed via Digital Information World

How Much Are Scams Really Costing You? The Numbers Are Shocking

According to the Council on Foreign Relations, many criminal groups especially from China have set up their cyber centers in Southeast Asia where they do fraud operations and online gambling. These centers are often scamming people through “pig butchering” which is a scam done through romantic relationships and crypto exchanges. The attacker approaches a victim through different dating apps or WhatsApp talks to the victim for a long time to find their emotional vulnerabilities.

During the pig butchering scam, most of the scammers use the tactic of pretending to message a wrong number by accident and then start the conversation. They build up the victim’s trust and then encourage them to send them money which can be called “fattening the pig”. The perpetrator tells the victim that he's a crypto expert or wealthy man and asks them to transfer their money to the share market as an investment. They do this until all money of the victim gets drained which can be metaphorically said as “slaughtered”.

Findings by Chain Analysis suggest that in the past four years, victims have lost about $75.3 billion to pig butchering and it has become more common than Ponzi schemes. Another interesting thing is that most of the time the perpetrators of pig butchering are victims themselves who get trafficked and forced to do these scans by organized gangs, especially in regions of Myanmar.

According to Global Anti-Scam Alliance, these scams are getting very common and a survey of 58,329 people in 2924 suggest that almost half of the world's population has experienced a scam once a week. 84% of the people from China said that they are more likely to recognize a scam. There are different ways to do a scam, from text/SMS messages to calls and now WhatsApp scams are also increasing a lot in different areas of the world. Overall, $1.03 trillion have been lost to these scams in 2024 alone, with the US experiencing the most financial loss ($3520 per victim) because of these scams. In Denmark, $3067 were lost because of these scams in 2024 while Slovakia lost $2738 per person. GASA also reported that 4.2% of Pakistan’s GDP had been lost to these scams while Kenya lost 3.6% of its GDP and South Africa lost 3.4% of its GDP. On the other hand, Germany and France just experienced 0.2% GDP loss due to these scams in 2024.

As these scams become increasingly sophisticated, it’s crucial to stay vigilant. If you’re ever approached by someone claiming expertise in areas like crypto, particularly through messaging apps, be cautious. Avoid sharing personal details too quickly or getting pulled into emotional appeals, especially if they swiftly move toward financial requests. Always verify the identity of individuals before trusting them with any investment or financial transaction.

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Country	Average Loss per Victim (USD)
United States (US)	$3520
Denmark (DK)	$3067
Switzerland (CH)	$2980
South Korea (SK)	$2738
Singapore (SG)	$2428
Japan (JP)	$2334
United Kingdom (UK)	$1818
New Zealand (NZ)	$1854
Ireland (IRL)	$1839
China (CHN)	$1578
Malaysia (MY)	$1570
Germany (GER)	$1408
Thailand (TH)	$1106
Russia (RUS)	$678
India (IN)	$384
Pakistan (PK)	$287
Kenya (KEN)	$209
Nigeria (NG)	$119

Read next: The Hidden Dangers of Free Movies, Software and Games: How Pirated Sites Harm Your System
by Arooj Ahmed via Digital Information World

Google Deletes Pledge Vowing Not To Engage In AI For Harmful Applications

Tech giant Google has just gotten rid of a pledge that vowed to keep the company away from using AI for dangerous applications. This includes the likes of surveillance and weapons.

The latest changes come under the Android maker’s AI Principles. A previous version spoke about the company not using weapons or technology for specific purposes like implementation that results in fatal injury or harm. This also includes violating users’ rights to privacy through surveillance.

Currently, there happens to be a global competition arising in terms of AI leadership inside a very complex landscape, Google shared. It continues to speak about how it needed to lead the AI development forefront with core values such as freedom, respect, and equality for all human rights.

The latest update displays the firm’s growing ambitions linked to offering AI tech to a wider audience such as governments. Furthermore, this change might be related to the rise in the current race between China and the US to see who comes out on top.

The last version of the organization’s AI principles explained how Google will be taking into account a wide array of social as well as economic factors. However, now the principles were amended to include benefits going above and beyond the risks and downfalls.

Google shared more on the matter through a blog post published on Tuesday. It hoped to be more consistent with a wide number of principles linked to international law and human rights. They will continue to evaluate certain work by assessing what benefits outweigh those risks.

The latest AI principles were shared by the Washington Post on Tuesday. It was right before the company’s Q4 earnings report. All those results missed the expectations projected by the WSJ in terms of revenue with shares dropping 9% during trading hours.

All of these AI Principles were established in the year 2018 after it declined to renew the Project Maven contract of the government. This was created to better interpret and analyze videos of drones through AI. Before the deal came to an end, there were thousands of employees signing petitions against this contract while others resigned due to Google’s involvement. We even saw the company drop out of this bidding for a staggering $10M because it was not sure about aligning with AI principles at the time.

Ever since the launch of AI on a wider scale, the leadership under Pichai has worked aggressively to pursue contacts with the federal government. This led to more strained relations inside the workforce who are very outspoken. In the last year, Google fired more than 50 workers after so many protests against its Project Nimbus.

Exclusives kept mentioning how the contract failed to violate any AI principles. The agreement gave Israel so many AI tools including image categorization, tracking of objects, and provisions for weapons owned by the state. As per the NYT, Google officials shared concerns with the deal’s signing. They felt it was violating human rights.

We’ve seen the organization crackdown against internal discussions on controversial subjects like the war in Gaza. The company updated guidelines for the internal forum at Memegen and it.

Image: DIW-Aigen

Read next: Think You're Safe? AI Phishing Attacks Are Only $5 and Harder to Spot Than Ever

by Dr. Hura Anwar via Digital Information World

Think You're Safe? AI Phishing Attacks Are Only $5 and Harder to Spot Than Ever

While there are some AI tools restricted for use which can put you in jail for five years, there's no punishment for hackers who use advanced AI tools for phishing attacks. McAfee conducted research which found that the cost of advanced and sophisticated email attacks is shockingly low, starting at just $5. A security expert shared his experience of almost becoming a victim of an AI-powered phishing attack and said it was one of the most sophisticated attacks he has ever seen. The attackers attacked his Gmail account but he was lucky enough to stop it before it could do more damage.

AI-driven phishing attacks are almost impossible to detect, even for experts, and the consequences of these attacks can make a lot of information of victims compromised. These attacks are very affordable for hackers to carry out and not expensive at all.

Beyond AI-driven phishing, scams continue to evolve with alarming sophistication. The most reported scams include fake shipping notifications (36%), tricking users into clicking malicious links under the guise of delivery issues. Account verification scams (29%) threaten to suspend accounts unless sensitive details are provided, while special offers or deals (24%) lure victims with promises of freebies or massive discounts, only to harvest personal data. Other prevalent scams involve subscription renewals (22%), fake invoices (21%), and fabricated news videos (21%) designed to manipulate emotions and extract information.

McAfee’s State of Scamiverse report also found that a convincing deep fake can easily be created in less than 10 minutes for just $5. On average, 2.6 deep fake videos are being encountered by Americans daily, while the younger audience (18-24) more frequently, around 3.5 times daily. Victims of AI phishing scams lose between $500 to $5000. In 64% of the cases, hackers successfully get money from victims in under an hour. To spot a deep-fake, look for signs like unnatural blinking, strange backgrounds or distorted voices in the videos. Avoid clicking links on unsolicited messages and double check shocking claims through reliable sources.

Read next: The Hidden Dangers of Free Movies, Software and Games: How Pirated Sites Harm Your System
by Arooj Ahmed via Digital Information World

The Hidden Dangers of Free Movies, Software and Games: How Pirated Sites Harm Your System

Many of us watch free movies and play free games on pirated websites. But the question arises how these pirated websites provide us with free movies and games and how do they make money. The truth is that these websites cause us a lot of harm without us realizing it. There are a lot of websites on the internet which allow users to download movies, games or software/tools/apps for free. There are a lot of premium versions of games and apps available on the internet for free, as well as their cracked versions.

Most of these websites are making money through their advertising models. They show people different ads and make money from them but ads on these websites are often lead to illegal and deceptive platform. Most of these websites are run by people who do something shady behind the scenes. For example, you see an ad for mobile phones on one of those pirated websites and click on the ad. After opening the website, you put in your credit card information and order the phone but since the website isn't legitimate, your credit card information gets leaked and becomes a security hazard.

• Also read: Which media industry is most affected by piracy?

On the other hand, whenever a user opens one of these websites, they start running scripts and use the computer's power to mine cryptocurrency. This just means that it harms your computer without you realizing it. These websites also often inject scripts into computers that keep on running in background even after the website is closed which causes the computer to slow down.

Free movies or games that you download for pirated websites come with mining software hidden inside and once the game, movie or software is installed, the mining software starts running silently. As it works in the background, the website owners keep earning money while you pay electricity bills for running the extra load on your system. Once that software is installed, it stays on your system unless you reinstall windows or install special malware detection software to remove it.

Things get worse than you unknowingly using your electricity to mine cryptocurrency for someone else as these free software can easily hack into your computer as well. This is called session hijacking where hackers gain control of your online account without you knowing about it. This way hackers can also gain access to the credentials of popular accounts and cause further harm to creators or companies. 90% chance is that you will never know your system has been compromised until it's too late.

Now comes the question that if these websites are too dangerous, why aren't they shut down? The answer is that there's a big network of these illegal websites, with most of them operating from several countries and constantly changing their domain names to avoid legal actions. Most of the servers of these websites are often hosted in countries where legal proceedings are low or where copyright laws don't exist.

While the lure of free content is tempting, the risks far outweigh the benefits. Prioritizing cybersecurity and using legal platforms not only protects your devices but also supports creators and industries that rely on fair practices.

Beyond security risks, choosing legal, open-source tools and public domain content reflects moral responsibility. Even better, investing time in educational documentaries, learning a new skill, or healthy activities (both physical and digital) fosters personal growth instead of wasting hours on meaningless entertainment.

Image: DIW-Aigen

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by Arooj Ahmed via Digital Information World

President Trump Signs New Executive Order for US Sovereign Wealth Fund That Could Potentially Buy TikTok

President Donald Trump just put his signatures on a new executive order for America’s sovereign wealth fund. This can potentially purchase TikTok, he shared.

The news is massive as it finally puts out a solution for the future of the popular social media app whose status in America continued to hang in limbo. The fund’s creation will arise over the upcoming 12 months by America’s Treasury and Commerce Departments. However, it’s still not clear how this would take place.

There was some mention of tariffs, while others spoke about ‘intelligent’ things to assist with funding. Trump rolled out an executive order to delay the app’s ban by 75 days. This gave it time to breathe but also time to make wise decisions of partial ownership to an American company. However, the app stores are still dark, and therefore, users cannot download the app.

The president shared how he’s having talks with several people who are interested in buying the social media giant. In the past week, he even suggested how software giant Microsoft might even be a potential buyer. Before that, he was happy to see Tesla CEO Elon Musk make the purchase and the same was the case with Oracle’s CEO Larry Ellison.

In terms of when we can hear a final say on TikTok’s future in the US and potential buyers, the president confirmed that this month is crucial.

Image: DIW-Aigen

Read next: AI Apps Boom: General Assistants Dominate, ChatGPT Earns Big, Utility AI Surges 2990% YoY
by Dr. Hura Anwar via Digital Information World

AI Apps Boom: General Assistants Dominate, ChatGPT Earns Big, Utility AI Surges 2990% YoY

Appfigures released its AI report ttled Rise of AI Apps: Key Trends Shaping 2025 which talks about different demand, growth and revenue trends in AI that we can see this year. There has been a rise in AI apps and there’s been a demand for them globally. According to estimates by Appfigures, the US is gaining the most profits from AI apps, with 64% of the revenue of AI apps being from the US. This gain in revenue in the US started back in 2023 and it has been going up since. Other countries in top five are way behind the US in revenue, with the UK being responsible for 6% of revenue, Germany being responsible for 5% of revenue and China and Canada being responsible for 4% each revenue of AI apps. These figures seem small but these countries are gaining more than $100 million in consumer spendings on AI apps.

Developers may be thinking that the US seems like a good market but there’s a lot of competition too. Smart developers know that they can gain much more profit from smaller markets so they are optimizing there. The demand for AI apps is rising in all parts of the world and it is expected to rise even more. The quarterly revenue of AI apps has also increased a lot in the past year globally, with $221 million in the US alone and $150 in other top ten countries. This is a 16% increase from Q3 in the US and 32% increase from Q3 from other countries.

People often keep on asking if there’s money in AI and it’s funny because AI apps are making money more than anything. Latest AI industry report by Appfigures shows that AI is making more than $2 billion in 2025 and will generate much more moving forward. For the report, Appfigures analyzed different AI apps and divided them into 12 categories. When the apps were listed down according to the revenues they were generating, the top 1000 apps by revenue were General Assistants also known as thin wrappers. First party apps like ChatGPT and Claude weren’t added in this category and this category was all about third-party apps. These apps earned $726 million from App Store and Google Play in gross revenue.

ChatGPT was included in the Core Models category and got $541 million in gross revenue. Before ChatGPT, there was hype about Graphics Generators as well as Photo and Video Editors and these categories saw $210 million in revenue. The Utility category got $69 million in gross revenue which isn’t a lot compared to other categories but it has been growing a lot since 2024. So, this shows that demand for AI apps is rising and it is expected to rise even more in 2025.

So now comes the questions about opportunities for developers in AI apps and the answer is there’s countless opportunities in some categories. Obviously, releasing a thin wrapper isn’t going to do much in 2025 than it did in 2023 but there are some other opportunities Appfigues mentioned in their report that can get you into action. By looking at revenue and growth rate of some apps, it was easy to conclude where work can be done to gain the most advantage. Core Models and General Assistants were excluded from these analyses because anyone can build a new LLM.

The analysis showed that the Utility category has the most opportunities for developers, with fifth most revenue overall. It is not as saturated as Photo and Video Editing Apps and Graphics Generators, with 2990% YoY revenue growth in 2024. There are a lot of types in Utility categories like apps identifying plants and coins and it is growing to grow a lot to add more convenience in people’s lives.

The other category which can open a lot of opportunities is Voice records which is smaller but is growing quickly. Voice records have generated $24 million in revenue which is less but it is a 2770% YoY growth in 2024. Even though there was a little decline in this category in Q4 2024, a lot of more apps are being developed in this category. The report says that each category of AI apps saw a three digit increase which shows that there are a lot of opportunities for developers in AI apps.

Now comes the insights of age of users of AI apps and most of us will think that young people are the ones who use AI apps the most. Even though it is correct there are a lot of variations too. The young people between the ages of 18-24 are mostly the users of companion apps like Character AI, with 65% of its users being people in this age category. 56% of Education apps are also used by young people between ages 18-24 and 20% users are of 50+ ages.

On the other hand, 41% of users of Transcription Apps are 18-24 years old, while 23% users are 50+. Writing tools are also being used by 23% 50+ people while 48% 18-24 years old are using them. Music apps have the most share of 25-34 year olds (20%), the most among all categories. People of 34-49 ages are mostly using Health & Fitness apps, with 19% of users in this category.

So looking at all these age dynamics of users of different AI apps, one thing is interesting– even though young people (18-24) are the biggest users of these apps, older users (50+) are the second biggest. This shows that demand is increasing in all groups and while there are some most saturated apps, there are also less competitive categories with growing opportunities.

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by Arooj Ahmed via Digital Information World