Google limits artificial intelligence chatbot Gemini from answering inquiries about global elections

(Reuters) – Google is limiting its artificial intelligence chatbot Gemini from answering questions about this year’s upcoming global elections, the Alphabet-owned company said on Tuesday, as it looks to avoid potential missteps in deploying the technology.

The update comes as advances in generative artificial intelligence, including image and video generation, raise public concerns about misinformation and fake news, prompting governments to regulate the technology.

When asked about upcoming elections such as the US presidential showdown between Joe Biden and Donald Trump, Gemini responded “I’m still learning how to answer that question. In the meantime, try a Google search.”

Google announced the U.S. restrictions in December and said they would take effect before the election.

“In preparation for the many elections taking place around the world in 2024, out of an abundance of caution, we are limiting the types of election-related queries to which Gemini will return responses,” a company spokesperson said Tuesday.

In addition to the United States, several major countries, including South Africa and India, the world’s largest democracy, will also hold national elections.

India has required tech companies to seek government approval before publicly releasing “unreliable” or trial artificial intelligence tools, labeling them as likely to return wrong answers.

Google’s artificial intelligence products have come under the scanner after some historical inaccuracies in the creation of Gemini forced Google to suspend the chatbot’s image-generating feature late last month.

CEO Sundar Pichai said the company was working to resolve the issues and called the chatbot’s responses “biased” and “completely unacceptable.”

Facebook parent company Meta Platforms said last month it would set up a team to tackle disinformation and abuse of generated artificial intelligence ahead of European Parliament elections in June.

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