A HISTORIAN has urged people not to share AI-generated or manipulated Occupation content online that has “flooded” Channel Island Facebook groups.
Dr Gilly Carr, who has spent much of her career researching the Channel Islands’ Occupation during WWII, has warned it can distort the truth and traumatize victims’ families.
“In recent months, Channel Islands’ Facebook groups have been flooded with people trying their hand at creating images using generative artificial intelligence (GenAI),” she said.
There has also been a man in Guernsey, who she doesn’t name, submitting her research on Guernsey victims of Nazism from the Frank Falla Archive into Gen AI to create short films.
GenAI, which works by scraping online content – whether it is true or false – to come up with answers, is “not a source of truth”, she said.
The content is often made by people “trying their hand” at it, who “are not always expert enough give it accurate instructions”, which she said can result in errors.
It is “also unethical” she added, because in examples she has seen “no permission was sought from family members to misrepresent their loved ones”.
It can can be traumatic for the family members of a victim or survivor of Nazism who have to see what their loved one endured, she added.
“And these emotions are further played with when the vision of the past is false. Such work is disrespectful, as it dishonours victims and survivors.”
