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Google Limits Gemini’s Election Responses To Curb Misinformation

By Nithya Bose in Business News, posted March 13, 2024

Google has confirmed it’s restricting AI chatbot Gemini, specifically limiting its responses to election-related queries.

This change, detailed in a recent blog post, was applied first in India amid the lead-up to the country's elections scheduled to commence in April.

This measure is Google's strategy to mitigate potential controversies surrounding artificial intelligence technologies.

Gemini, Google's counterpart to the popular ChatGPT, is designed to furnish text responses and generate images in response to user queries.

A Google spokesperson said this decision aligns with the company's previously outlined election approach.

They said: "As we shared last December, in preparation for the many elections happening around the world in 2024 and out of an abundance of caution, we're restricting the types of election-related queries for which Gemini will return responses."

This year, several countries globally, including the US, UK, and South Africa, are scheduled to conduct elections.

In tests conducted by the BBC, Gemini consistently replied to questions about these upcoming elections with: "I'm still learning how to answer this question. In the meantime, try Google Search."

However , when asked questions concerning Indian politics, Gemini provided more comprehensive information about the nation's principal political parties.

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Fears over misinformation

The advancement in generative AI has sparked concern over misinformation, leading to increased regulatory efforts by governments worldwide.

India has mandated tech firms to obtain official approval before using AI tools that could disseminate "unreliable" information or are in experimental stages.

Google faced backlash earlier in the year when Gemini misrepresented historical figures.

It includes an erroneous depiction of the US Founding Fathers and inaccurate representations of German soldiers during World War Two.

Google immediately "paused" the tool, writing in a blog post that it was "missing the mark."

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