Google's AI overviews give misleading health advice, raises mental health concerns
Rosie Weatherley from mental health charity Mind has raised concerns about Google's new AI Overviews after reports showed the feature was giving misleading health advice to billions of users.
Mind has launched a year-long commission to examine how AI affects mental well-being.
AI overviews replace credible sources with oversimplified answers
Weatherley explained that while AI Overviews seem quick and easy, they replace credible sources with oversimplified answers.
In testing, the AI wrongly suggested starvation is healthy, blamed mental illness on chemical imbalances, and claimed most benefit claims are fake—none of which are true or safe.
Bad advice about psychosis or eating disorders could stop people
Mind's team flagged these risks in response to The Guardian's investigation.
Stephen Buckley warned that bad advice about psychosis or eating disorders could stop people from getting help.
Anna Jewell from Pancreatic Cancer UK also pointed out that telling patients to avoid high-fat foods was just plain wrong.
Google says it's working to make its AI more accurate
Google says it's working to make its AI more accurate and says it "takes action under our policies where appropriate," including removing some AI Overviews for highlighted search terms.
The Guardian found that repeating the same search could produce different AI summaries at different times.