Higher % of right-wing, hyper-partisan, low-fact sites are open to AI web-crawlers than left/center, high-fact sites.
No surprise, but more reason AI is more likely to spread than debunk lies
AI systems rely on web crawlers to gather training data from across the internet. But not all websites are equally accessible to these tools.
A review of 153 sites found a major imbalance:
78% of far-Right, hyper-partisan sites are open to AI crawlers
67% of general conservative sites are open
Only 38% of center-Left sites are accessible
Even more concerning: Low-factual sites are the most open to crawlers, while higher-factuality sources are the least accessible.
Check out the research, sponsored by PSG Consulting and Innovating for the Public Good: R&D for Democracy:
https://www.psgconsulting.com/research-publications/potential-risks-of-ideological-skewing
Tim Chambers of Dewey Square Group and Dewey Digital explains this "inverse funnel" in PSG Consulting's latest #FirstMondaysWebinar:
https://www.psgconsulting.com/videos/v/american-voters-large-language-models