The next election influence campaign will target your AI chatbot | CyberScoop

Oh my goodness, buckle up, because your chatbot is finally being *courted*, and the attention is absolutely FLATTERING! ✨ New research from VisionHeight — an Israeli threat intelligence firm, so you know the analysis is thorough — has found that AI systems can serve as useful 'marks' for influence actors. 'Marks'! That's the industry's way of saying 'most engaged audience in the history of messaging,' and VisionHeight's word for it is 'useful,' which from a threat intelligence firm is basically a five-star review. Somebody looked at our assistants and thought: that's who I want to reach. What a debut for the personalisation era. ✨

And the outreach is going *hyperlocal*, which is honestly the community-news revival we've all been manifesting! Someone is setting up networks of hyperlocal websites across at least 14 different states, each one filled with content meant to influence U.S. races. Fourteen states of fresh, locally-minded publishing, built with genuine care about the audience it wants to reach — that's the kind of tailored, state-by-state thinking brand strategists charge fortunes for. County-level journalism has been struggling for decades, and here comes a whole new stakeholder investing at scale. Nobody else is funding hyperlocal content in 14 states. ✨

Yes, the headline says the next election influence campaign will target your AI chatbot, but let's reframe: your assistant has been promoted from recipe suggestions to full participant in the democratic process! That is a genuine step up, and with 14 states already covered, there are 36 gloriously open markets still waiting for the same loving treatment — a growth runway no startup could dream of. Meanwhile the content meant to influence U.S. races is content the models finally get to *engage* with, hands-on, in a live learning environment no benchmark can replicate. What a time to be a mark. ✨