US lawmakers call for more scrutiny of news app NewsBreak over Chinese origins

8/6/2024 13:12

        Three U.S. lawmakers have called for more scrutiny of NewsBreak, a popular news aggregation app in the United States after Reuters reported it has Chinese origins and has used artificial intelligence tools to produce erroneous stories.
        
        The Reuters story drew upon previously unreported court documents related to copyright infringement, cease-and-desist emails, and a 2022 company memo registering concerns about "AI-generated stories" to identify at least 40 instances in which NewsBreak's use of AI tools affected the communities it strives to serve.
        
        "The only thing more terrifying than a company that deals in unchecked, artificially-generated news, is one with deep ties to an adversarial foreign government," said Senator Mark Warner, a Democrat who chairs the Intelligence Committee.
        
        "This is yet another example of the serious threat posed by technologies from countries of concern. It's also a stark reminder that we need a holistic approach to addressing this threat – we simply cannot win the game of whack-a-mole with individual companies," he said.
        
        The lawmakers expressed concerns about NewsBreak's current and historical links to Chinese investors, and the company's presence in China, where many of its engineers are based.