Meta is usually known for making big announcements. This time, however, Mark Zuckerberg's company was surprisingly subdued when it rolled out AI Studio in France: Since the end of July, French Instagram and Messenger app users have been able to create personalized chatbots or chat with ones made by other users.
Users can now talk to an artificial intelligence (AI) version of a psychologist, a cooking expert, a version of Batgirl, a parody of Vladimir Putin or even a "virtual girlfriend." All of these bots are created by the platforms' users, based on Llama, Meta's large language model. It only takes a few seconds to set up a chatbot by describing its purpose and personality, with the option to add further instructions if needed. The user can then decide whether to make their chatbot publicly accessible or restrict it to their friends only.
However, Meta has warned that "we review AIs you create" before they are published, to ensure they do not violate the platform's rules. Yet the review process is rather superficial. Naruto, Harry Potter, the French YouTuber Squeezie, God, Marilyn Monroe, Breaking Bad's Walter White and even France's prime minister, François Bayrou: Le Monde quickly found many chatbots that impersonate real people, fictional characters covered by copyright protections, and religious figures – including several Jesus Christ bots – all of which are forbidden by Meta. While some of these bots appeared not to have interacted with any users, others have already exchanged millions of messages.
Furthermore, despite rules prohibiting the chatbots from posing as financial advisers, dozens of AI bots dedicated to cryptocurrency, personal finance or investment could be found easily.
The few profiles tested by Le Monde only repeated general statements. However, in just a few moments, we were able to create a bot specialized in financial advice that encouraged beginners to invest online via the fraudulent trading website RiveGarde, which a previous Le Monde investigation found was connected to an organized crime network. It was then possible to share the chatbot with friends after it went through Meta's automatic verification process, which took less than a minute.
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