Utah Gov. Spencer Cox has cautioned that Chinese and Russian bots are generating and spreading misleading content online to “encourage violence” in the wake of Charlie Kirk’s assassination.
Kirk, a prominent political commentator and conservative influencer, was fatally shot while on stage at an event held at Utah Valley University on Sept. 10. He was 31.
At the press conference on Sept. 11, Cox said that there is a “tremendous amount of disinformation” being monitored by state authorities.
“What we’re seeing is our adversaries want violence,” Cox said. “We have bots from Russia, China, all over the world, that are trying to instill disinformation and encourage violence.”
The Republican governor didn’t go into detail about the authorities’ findings, but urged the public to ignore such disinformation.
His comments come amid renewed concern about the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP’s) disinformation and propaganda campaign beyond its borders.
OpenAI said in a June report that the company has taken action against a number of ChatGPT accounts linked to an influence operation originating from communist China.
Malicious actors used the company’s generative artificial intelligence (AI) models to create profile images impersonating individuals such as U.S. veterans critical of the Trump administration, and to produce U.S. political content on various social media platforms, including X and Bluesky. Researchers said the operation aimed to exploit the political divisions in the United States.
Dubbed “Uncle Spam,” this operation is one of the 10 cases identified by the company that utilized its AI chatbot in malicious ways. OpenAI said it had blocked all accounts associated with these malicious operations.
Aside from social media, there are also fake websites that employ AI tools to pose as legitimate news outlets, according to an August report from online analytics company Graphika.
The report identified 11 domains, along with 16 related social media accounts, that “laundered exclusively” English-language articles published by China Global Television Network (CGTN), the overseas arm of China’s state-run media China Central Television (CCTV).
The network primarily spreads pro-China, anti-West content in different languages, employing AI tools to “generate logos and text specifically designed to target different audiences, including young audiences in Africa, the Americas, Asia, and Europe,” according to the report.
Cox, at the press conference, encouraged the public to turn off the streams and spend more time with their loved ones.
“For those people who are spending so much time on social media, I think Charlie said it best that when things get bad, [put] phones down, and spend a little time with our families,” he said.
“We desperately need some healing.”
By Dorothy Li
