A computer-generated voice pretending to be President Joe Biden is telling Democrats not to vote in an upcoming primary. Kathy Sullivan, a respected Democrat in New Hampshire, is upset about this and wants the people behind it to face legal consequences, calling it an “attack on democracy.”
The fake call started with a casual remark often associated with the president and then told Democrats to skip voting in the primary and save their votes for the November election. Sullivan, a lawyer, thinks this might break some laws and is determined to find out who’s responsible. The New Hampshire attorney general says voters should ignore the call.
This situation has led to an investigation, and a recording of the call was released by NBC News. Sullivan’s phone number was in the message, raising worries about privacy and potential harassment.
This comes at a time when people are debating the use of computer programs in politics. Recently, OpenAI stopped a developer from using a computer program to mimic a Democratic candidate. Advocacy groups like Public Citizen are calling for rules on using computer programs in political ads, but it might take a while to sort out. The incident with the fake call and chatbot pretending to be a politician is making people concerned about how computer programs could mess with elections. Some state lawmakers are also thinking about laws to stop this kind of thing, highlighting worries about how vulnerable our elections might be to computer manipulation in an important election year.