Activist group using AI to flood ABC with thousands of bias complaints

Activist groups are using artificial intelligence to target the ABC’s coverage of the Middle East with accusations of bias, contributing to a sharp rise in the number of coordinated complaints detected by the public broadcaster’s independent ombudsman.

One of those groups is Pen Power Australia, which has been using AI technology to coordinate complaints to the ABC’s board and management to attempt to correct what it sees as bias and make coverage more favourable to Israel.

A new report released by the ABC’s Ombudsman on Thursday found that organised complaint campaigns rose sharply over the past year, in part due to the assistance of artificial intelligence.

The report did not name Pen Power, but ABC ombudsman Fiona Cameron identified 48 “campaigns” during the year ending June 30 which accounted for 5259 total complaints, or 61 per cent of all content complaints received.

“Complaints were categorised as campaigns where a concentration of complaints raised similar concerns about the same content within a specific period. They may be substantively similar or identically worded or appear coordinated,” the ombudsman’s report notes.

The report underscores how coordinated campaigns are making it more difficult for organisations like the ABC to gauge the level of community anger over hot-button issues such as the Middle East as they seek to balance genuine engagement with resisting pressure campaigns.

Pen Power’s coordinator John Grimwade said the campaigns he had organised could have anything from 100 people to a few thousand sending complaint letters if he could enlist support from overseas groups.

“Our campaigns go out as required,” Grimwade said. “We try to keep up with the ABC in particular but so many of their reports are biased or statements made that lack proper context.”

In March, ABC chair Kim Williams defended the broadcaster against accusations of bias, saying it stood by its coverage of the conflict in the Middle East .

Grimwade, an Adelaide retiree, confirmed the group has used a platform called Activist Mailer, which boasts online of letting users coordinate campaigns with artificial intelligence.

The platform’s website claims that its platform makes what would otherwise appear as a barrage of emails appear “unique” by using different words, tone, formating and length to deliver the same coordinated message, “each sent directly from supporters’ own inboxes”.

“The result? Messages that get read, voices that get heard, and movements that drive real change.”

But Grimwade is planning on changing to a new AI platform. “I am currently using the Activist Mailer but will be changing most of our campaigns over to the new AI,” Grimwade said.

Letter-writing campaigns have worked in the past. In late 2023, the ABC sacked casual radio host Antoinette Lattouf after a coordinated letter-writing campaign targeted members of the broadcaster’s board and management team, including then-chair Ita Buttrose.