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Fake US thinktank funded by Israel sought to prime chatbots for pro-Israel propaganda

newsAug 26, 202616688

A pro-Israel messaging website using the name Hanover Institute for Public Policy published 124 reports totaling more than 560,000 words across nine days, Guardian analysis shows. The Hanover Institute name does not correspond to any legal entity, lists no staff or bylines, and gives no physical address; the site used a commercial platform that promises to optimize content so AI chatbots will cite it. The New York media production company Piro Inc filed the site this month with the US Department of Justice under the Foreign Agents Registration Act as material distributed for the Israeli government. Guardian reporting shows the site published 73 reports on 12 and 13 August alone, producing almost 354,000 words in two days, and nearly all report headlines begin with questions that could mirror chatbot queries. The reports present Israel’s positions on issues including prisoner torture, alleged Israeli war crimes, and claims Israel deliberately starved Palestinians in Gaza, and they include citations to sources such as the World Bank, UN agencies, Amnesty International, and the Genocide Convention. The Guardian says the effort is part of a wider campaign financed by tens of millions of dollars routed through intermediaries including Havas Media, and that a contract for the campaign commits to the deployment of websites and content to deliver GPT framing results on GPT conversations. The site added a funding page after its existence was reported; nothing has been published there since the first Guardian articles about the Hanover Institute.

The Guardian
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Fake US thinktank set up and funded by Israel sought to game AI for propaganda

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