AI Ads Flood US Midterms as Campaigns Race to Deploy Cheap Synthetic Content
BBC Verify tracked dozens of AI-generated political ads across US races, finding the technology has become a routine campaign tool rather than a rare experiment.
BBC Verify has tracked dozens of artificial intelligence (AI) generated ads to assess how political campaigns are using them in the US midterms, finding that AI is now a routine part of election advertising rather than a rare experiment [4]. Campaigns are using these tools to create images, voices, and videos quickly and at low cost, with the ads ranging from simple visual effects to fully synthetic content [4]. The tracking shows that AI ads are spreading across many races, raising new questions about how voters can tell what is real [4]. BBC Verify's review focuses on how the ads are made and where they appear, and does not judge whether they are true or false [4].