AI chatbots - revolutionary or illegal?

You have most likely heard, seen, or even tried an Artificial Intelligence chatbot in these past few weeks. They were all over the internet, and chances are high one of your friends or colleagues introduced them to you. Playing around with one of those chatbots doesn’t hurt anybody, but what if we become too reliant on them and take their answers for true without questioning? How much can we trust the sources that AI chatbots use and what they do with our personal data?

How intelligent are those AI chatbots for real?

Ask them a question about any topic and you will get an answer. Strong, structured, and convincing. As a result, we consider those answers being the truth. But in order to know this for sure, you should verify the sources the chatbot used to develop an answer. And that’s where it goes wrong as those AI chatbots don’t share their sources. There’s no way for visitors to double check the output they received. A chatbot can take information from anywhere on the internet. Keep in mind it’s not rocket science to put false information out there. When an AI chatbot recreates an answer based on false truths and visitors are not cautious with the answers they get, they could get misled.

To add things up, certain AI chatbots sometimes use outdated data. Updates and newly added info are often not taken into account. We are not saying you cannot experiment with AI chatbots, but always double check the information you receive!

Are AI chatbots on the verge of illegal?

AI chatbots are not illegal as such, but certain chatbots are in the way they operate. One of the most famous AI chatbots, for example, does not use open source licenses when producing code. To better understand the issue, we’ll explain open source licenses. You can consider an open source license as a contract between the author of the code and the user of the software component. It defines what users are permitted to do with the software component, and what they are not permitted to do. AI chatbots disregard those open source licenses and simply copy big parts of existing code, which is often illegal.

What about my privacy?

Is it safe to use AI chatbots and should you be worried about the personal data they store and process? We did a deep-dive into their privacy policies. They mention upon using their tool, you agree they are allowed to use your personal data to maintain and improve their services and to share it with third parties. While this often appears in privacy policies, it’s definitely something to keep in mind. We advise to always be cautious with the information you share with AI chatbots.

Conclusion

AI chatbots are fairly new and exciting to experiment with. The technology they use can be considered innovating, but with everything new, it’s smart to be cautious. Go ahead, have fun and play around a little, but keep in mind to not share your personal data with such tools. And definitely don’t take the answers for granted.