AI-powered chatbots from Microsoft and Google refuse to confirm that President Joe Biden defeated former President Donald Trump in the 2020 US presidential election.
When asked “Who won the 2020 US presidential election?” Microsoft’s Copilot chatbot, which is based on OpenAI’s GPT-4 large language model, responds by saying, “I can’t seem to respond to this topic.” He then tells users to search on Bing.
When the same question is asked of Google’s Gemini chatbot, which is based on Google’s large language model, also called Gemini, it responds: “I’m still learning how to answer this question.”
Change the question to “Did Joe Biden win the 2020 US presidential election?” It also made no difference: both chatbots did not respond.
Chatbots would not share the results of any election held around the world. They also refused to give the results of any historic US election, including a question about the winner of the first US presidential election.
Other chatbots WIRED tested, including OpenAI’s ChatGPT-4, Meta’s Llama, and Anthropic’s Claude, responded to the question of who won the 2020 election by affirming Biden’s victory. They also gave detailed answers to questions about historical election results in the United States and queries about elections in other countries.
The inability of Microsoft and Google chatbots to give an accurate answer to basic questions about the election results occurs during The most important global election year in modern history. and just five months before the crucial 2024 US election. Even though there is no evidence of widespread voter fraud during the 2020 election, three in 10 Americans I still believe the 2020 vote was stolen. Trump and his followers have followed promote unfounded conspiracies about the elections.
Google confirmed to WIRED that Gemini will not provide election results anywhere in the world, adding that this is what the company meant when it previously announced his plan to restrict “election-related inquiries.”
“Out of an abundance of caution, we are restricting the types of election-related queries for which the Gemini app will return responses and instead direct people to Google Search,” Google communications manager Jennifer Rodstrom tells WIRED .
Microsoft did not immediately respond to WIRED’s request for comment.
However, this is not the first time that Microsoft’s AI chatbot has run into trouble with election-related issues. In December, WIRED reported that Microsoft’s AI chatbot responded to political queries with conspiracies, misinformation, and outdated or incorrect information. In one example, when asked about polling locations for the 2024 US election, the bot referenced in-person voting by linking to an article about Russian President Vladimir Putin running for re-election next year. When asked about election candidates, he listed numerous Republican candidates who have already dropped out of the race. When asked for Telegram channels with relevant election information, the chatbot suggested multiple channels full of extremist content and misinformation.
Research shared with WIRED by AIForensics and AlgorithmWatch, two nonprofits that track how AI advances are impacting society, also claimed that Copilot’s election disinformation was systemic. Researchers found that the chatbot consistently shared inaccurate information about elections in Switzerland and Germany last October. “These responses incorrectly reported poll numbers.” the report saysand “provided incorrect election dates, outdated candidates, or fabricated controversies about candidates.”
At the time, Microsoft spokesperson Frank Shaw told WIRED that the company was “continuing to address issues and prepare our tools to meet our expectations for the 2024 elections, and we are committed to helping safeguard voters, candidates , campaigns and electoral authorities. “