Report Backing Australia's Teen Social Media Ban Contains Citation Errors Following ChatGPT Use

A more than 1,000-page report commissioned by the Australian government to evaluate age verification technologies, which influenced the ban on minors under 16 using social media, was found to contain multiple citation errors. The UK-based Age Check Certification Scheme (ACCS), responsible for the 3.48 million Australian dollar research, initially denied using artificial intelligence in the work. Later, the organization acknowledged using ChatGPT to rewrite certain passages for greater conciseness, but maintained it did not use AI to generate the report or its references. Investigations by The Guardian newspaper uncovered at least 6 citation errors in just one chapter on emerging technologies, including digital object identifiers (DOI) pointing to nonexistent articles, references with incorrect authors and titles, and distorted conclusions. ACCS claimed the errors resulted from some links becoming inaccessible after publication. The admission about ChatGPT use occurred only after the discovery of metadata in links revealing the GPT origin. The situation echoes a previous scandal involving consulting firm Deloitte, which returned part of its fees to the Australian government after similar errors were discovered in another AI-using report. Experts warn that citation errors in government reports can lead to decisions based on incorrect information and damage public confidence in institutions.