The Double-Edged Sword of AI in Crisis Communication

Artificial intelligence is revolutionizing crisis communications, but what happens when powerful tools fall into the wrong hands? Jonathan Bernstein, chairman and founder of Bernstein Crisis Communications, joins host Peter Woolfolk to explore this complex landscape. You’ll hear about AI's ability to transform anyone into a seemingly credible source, raising pressing concerns about authenticity and the spread of misinformation. From empowering small PR firms with efficient press releases to posing ethical dilemmas in educational settings, AI's dual-edged nature is laid bare.

As AI tools like ChatGPT become ubiquitous, their applications in both professional arenas and activist circles are scrutinized. The rapid compilation of data can arm activists with information, true or false, against corporations. This episode tackles the challenges of discerning the truth in this AI-driven age, stressing the significance of mastering AI research skills. We also address the looming threat of AI-generated visuals and audio, which could easily mislead audiences if not carefully monitored.

The podcast doesn't just highlight the dangers but also emphasizes solutions. We discuss the urgent need for PR professionals to either attain AI expertise or collaborate with those who do. Jonathan Bernstein offers a candid warning: real-world experience is vital, and credentials should never be taken at face value. As the legal and ethical implications of AI-generated content continue to evolve, staying informed and vigilant is indispensable for anyone in the communication field. Join us as we unearth the potential and pitfalls of AI in public relations, and thank Jonathan Bernstein for sharing his invaluable insights.

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Chapters

• 1:10 Crisis Communication in Artificial Intelligence
• 11:15 Ethical Concerns in AI Communication
• 16:55 Risk of AI Misinformation and Defamation
• 24:50 Preparing for AI Crisis Communication
• 29:07 Importance of AI in PR

Transcript

Announcer: 1:11

Welcome to the Public Relations Review Podcast, a program to discuss the many facets of public relations with seasoned professionals, educators, authors and others. Now here is your host, peter Woolfolk.

Peter Woolfolk: 1:31

Welcome to the Public Relations Review Podcast and to our listeners all across America and around the world. Now, this podcast has been ranked by Apple as among one of the top 1% of podcasts worldwide, so I'd like to thank all of our guests and listeners for being the basis for making this happen, and we certainly would appreciate getting a review from you at the end of the podcast as well. Now, today, the topic for today is the episode is crisis communications, particularly as it applies to artificial intelligence. First, I'd like to read several accolades that my guest has received for his work. The first one says being a great crisis manager is like learning a new language or running a marathon. We'd all love the accolades, but the amount of work it takes to get there is overwhelming. Even worse, the only way to get the mastery is through an excruciatingly painful process.

Peter Woolfolk: 2:27

The second one says if you or your organization do not wish to suffer from the either deserved or undeserved criticism from your actions or inactions, it's incumbent upon you to call upon Bernstein Crisis Management now.

Peter Woolfolk: 2:43

But while they've reliably demonstrated time after time that can help clients minimize damage after things have gone bad, they really earn their pay when they're given the opportunity to show clients how to take proactive steps to avoid problems before they occur. Having worked in the crisis management field for most of my professional life, I can honestly say that Jonathan is one of the best practitioners on the planet. So to seek his good counsel is an indication of your own management powers, for it shows that you understand that protecting your organization involves much more than hoping nothing happens. And this comes from a director of public affairs at the Import-Export Bank of the United States. Would you be comfortable getting crisis communication from someone who's earned a certificate in crisis communication by attending a seminar for several hours in a hotel, or would you like to sign up with a proven, battle-tested expert, especially in the age of artificial intelligence?

Peter Woolfolk: 3:45

So my guest today is Jonathan Bernstein. He is the chairman and founder of Bernstein Crisis Communications. He joins me today from Palm Desert, California. So, Jonathan, welcome to the podcast. Thank you so much for having me Look. As I mentioned, obviously, crisis communications is very important to understanding problems that can be caused by ne'er-do-wells people who want to cause some issues. So what, your point of view, are some of the main things that people should look out for when it comes to artificial intelligence as a damage that it can possibly cause?

Jonathan Bernstein: 4:23

Well, peter, I can say definitively, after some of my experiences of the last year in particular, that artificial intelligence is going to test the human intelligence of its users, and I've never been so happy that I've been a nerd for over 40 years and kind of grown up with the internet, because it really helps understand what systems like ChatGPT are doing. But you've already mentioned one of the big things that's going to happen is that bad actors will be empowered. You've already mentioned one of the big things that's going to happen is that bad actors will be empowered For better or for worse.

Jonathan Bernstein: 4:58

Ai turns incompetent writers into moderately skilled writers and competent speakers into moderately skilled readers. It can literally, visually or in writing, turn them into something which presents as something that they are not. But it doesn't matter, because AI will change their image, change their words, change the inflection speed of their voice and any one of a number of other factors. Normally you have to train a human being to do, and so it ends up seemingly adding credibility to communicators who don't deserve it. And I mean, on the plus side it's you know, many ways. For example, smaller PR operations will benefit more, I think, than larger ones, particularly those that have no PR staff or agency or individuals who have a complaint because they can generate press releases.

Jonathan Bernstein: 5:55

I've had Chatsheet PD, for example, draft a press release for a mine disaster, simulate it. It was a great press release. I could improve it a little bit, but it was a great press release. And you know, unfortunately college professors are seeing young would-be professionals use the same tools to generate their homework and it's almost impossible to detect other than AI is sometimes better than the original student and the professor can tell that. But I personally know two professors who've gotten out of the field because they're so disgusted with what students can do with AI.

Jonathan Bernstein: 6:37

So, and the thing that most people, I think, forget about with AI, but it's been true for the lifetime of the modern Internet, there was an old acronym in the origin of the Internet GIGO G-I-G-O. Garbage in, garbage out.

Peter Woolfolk: 6:52

Oh yeah, I remember that one.

Jonathan Bernstein: 6:55

It's only, as you know, the use of AI is only as good as the operator is skilled in making requests. You know anybody can produce the basic results, but if you really want good results, just like with a good Google search, you need to know how to do it.

Jonathan Bernstein: 7:12

And that's what's missing a lot. I think staying on top of the latest potential AI tools will be challenging for anybody and, as with the early days of social media, a lot of people won't get it. They just won't get it. They will never click with that. But you know, it still gives a versatility, tremendous versatility across a wide range of media. Graphics to illustrate news is very easy to generate without needing to buy stock images. Unfortunately, or fortunately, depending on who you're with. If you're a crisis firm who deals with intellectual property, well, there's going to be a lot of allegations of intellectual property theft coming out of the way that AI brings together information from a lot of different sources without necessarily acknowledging the source really aware of. Is that AI results? If they're, for example, chat, gpt, are rife with inaccuracies based on what the algorithm perceives to be the consensus truth and that's a really important phrase. I made that up. I think it's still an important phrase the consensus truth, which isn't necessarily accurate.

Jonathan Bernstein: 8:32

So you have to fact check your results more than probably any other search that's ever been done, because it literally tries to please you in some ways and make up stuff that's totally wrong, and I've caught it many times doing that. That said, it's still faster and more effective than a team of young PR pros doing the research for you.

Peter Woolfolk: 9:08

Well, let me just answer that right quick, because sometimes I certainly do use ChatGPT. If I want to, let's say, maybe do a synopsis, for example, of an opening letter, I'll let it write what it writes and then I'll go through and then make the changes that I feel are necessary to make me feel comfortable or put it in the right way. I'm just not, I just don't accept what it presents to me. It just presents, let's say, the skeleton, if you will, that I'm looking for and I can go in and make the changes that I want so that it fits my style and way that I communicate. For all practical purposes it just minimizes some of the time I have to put into some issues or writing.

Jonathan Bernstein: 9:41

Exactly. It will also imitate styles. So if you would like something, for example, to be written in the style of William Shakespeare, it'll do that. So if you want to sound more, you know, kamala Harris or Donald Trump-like, you can do that. Clearly, donald Trump, stuff wasn't written by artificial intelligence, because there's very little intelligence. But that's my opinion, but that's my political bias, but you know. That said, the way that you can make things fit as you say, your style or anybody else's style, is instantly I mean instantly, literally in under 60 seconds, usually with a chat GPT is phenomenal, and I don't think people even realize the versatility.

Jonathan Bernstein: 10:45

If you don't mind, let me tell you some of the chat, gpt chats. I've done research, I've done recently.

Peter Woolfolk: 10:51

Okay.

Jonathan Bernstein: 10:52

Just to see the wide variety of things you can do with this. So I'm having a dispute with a dentist right now. So I've had a really good research report prepared for me on dental ethics and specific to the state of California, and gave me good information I can take to my dentist and say here, I don't think you're complying with this. If I'm a big-time troublemaker for a large corporation, I can use the same tactics Look up all the negative information you can find on XYZ Corporation. It'll find it all for me in seconds and then, whether it's true or not, if I'm an activist, I might just publish the whole thing just as it is, without even citing a source, since nobody seems to care much about sources these days. And this is the biggest risk it sounds credible. Whether it is or not, it sounds credible and that's everything on the internet is credible not being not actually being fact checkable, but sounding like you're credible, and one of the ways that activists used to undermine themselves in the past was to rant a lot. This allows them to get around that problem and because ranting undermines your credibilities.

Jonathan Bernstein: 12:05

But I've also done research on how to to customize. I wanted to make a customized wrapping paper design. It did that for me. It looked up the origin of some important phrases, looked up the importance of the pH balance and cleaning carpets, gave me a list of the top small business insurers so I could get out a new liability policy. You know, it gave me a lot of election night watch parties. I wanted to know where there were election night watch parties, which resulted in my announcing my own election night watch party and literally you know. And where can I get what hotels in Las Vegas feature adjoining rooms? I mean, you can ask anything and you can ask for it in as much detail as you want.

Announcer: 12:58

I want 10 examples.

Jonathan Bernstein: 12:59

I want 20 examples of hotel rooms.

Jonathan Bernstein: 13:03

I want 10 examples of what this company has gotten in trouble with, legally or not, and the good thing is, if a client hires me now, I can look for you know, I always look up data about a prospective client immediately online.

Jonathan Bernstein: 13:20

I'm always quick and good at Google searching, but now, if I do the same search with ChatGPT, I get a lot more information a lot more quickly, and solid information is critical to crisis communications decision making, and so this allows a lot of information to be collated, sorted, organized in any way I want, and I had a client environmentally related clients who was being accused of greenwashing, you know, claiming to be green in their practices but actually not, and so I wanted to understand all about greenwashing practices that they're being criticized for, and ChatGPT told me all about it instantly. So the uses are truly infinite, and I'm, you know, nerd though I am, I'm still only barely touching the surface of what can be done done, but I have experimented both with images and image related AI and with research related AI like chat GPT. I still haven't found anything better than chat GPT.

Peter Woolfolk: 14:28

All the let's try the competition you know, one of the things that I'm getting out of this is that, particularly when you say that people need to read and check what they're getting, fact-check what they're getting, because that is one of the problems that crisis communications is, or part of crisis communications is that these ChatGPT and several of the others can write misinformation and it's being published and if you don't take the time to read it and double-check it, then you can perhaps have a problem, particularly if you're trying to get some business or prevent some business or use it for the basis of taking some action, but the information is incorrect, then you can create some problems for yourself because you didn't fact check what it is that you got from this particular source.

Jonathan Bernstein: 15:16

Right, and hopefully good actors fact check and bad actors don't, because then you can call them on it. But, um, but you know, it really depends on it's. It's.

Peter Woolfolk: 15:25

It comes down to the skill of the operator, and I I can't think of a more important skill for a young vr professional right now than to become a master of of ai research well, other thing too as we talked about the written part, there's also some visual problems that have come up, that have been shown on the news, where real people appear to be saying things that you wouldn't expect them to say, so that artificial intelligence can actually or some programs can actually replicate voices of real people but put the incorrect information into those voices, which really causes some problems if people don't take the time to look into it.

Jonathan Bernstein: 16:09

Yes, and everybody knows the term Photoshopped by now. Well, think, photoshopped on steroids. That's AI. Photoshopped is still a human being making the changes, but AI can make changes to images in a way far superior to most human beings and certainly quicker than any human being, probably. So, yes, I agree with you. It's going to give the appearance of credibility or truth to information that is not credible or true, and most people don't check, so bad actors will get away with it, and it'll be up to the people responding to them to call out the lies.

Peter Woolfolk: 16:56

Let me ask you then are there programs? I mean, obviously there are programs that can write whatever you tell it to write inaccurate or whatever but are there programs that can detect misinformation? Let's say that you see something and you're not quite certain about it. Is there a program that you can put this into and ask for it to check for its accuracy? For its accuracy? Unfortunately no.

Jonathan Bernstein: 17:23

You've got. When it comes to news information, of course you know, thank God there are now finally a lot of news organizations doing fact-checking, but that isn't all information. So no, there isn't. It's one of the things plaguing college professors. It's very, you know, unless they want to personally pull out data to try to find where that brilliant phrase came from over, say, an entire thesis, and, for that matter, even AI will give you the sources.

Jonathan Bernstein: 17:59

It just may not be accurate. A simple example when I asked for information on hotels, it gave me some links that are no longer functional links. I asked for URLs, but the links aren't valid URLs anymore Now if. I was publishing that in a travel article I'd be giving away information. That's not that people would click on it and go to a 404 page error or, worse, to a bad site. And yet that was produced by AI.

Peter Woolfolk: 18:33

It gets a little bit scary when you see that these things are coming along across so many different platforms. You know, particularly online you read almost every other day that some governments or other people are particularly now I see that. You know, particularly with the voting coming up, that a lot of misinformation is being passed along and folks are not quite sure what to do about it, how to go about checking it, maybe other than calling up what might be the implied source about that sort of thing.

Jonathan Bernstein: 19:09

Exactly, and AI is also assisting hackers with human engineering you know social engineering to get them to appear to be someone they weren't. There was a famous case last year, maybe two years ago, that the person responsible for cutting checks for a large organization thought that they had received video calls and audio calls from several members of their executive team authorizing them to redistribute money to this place and that place and this place. It was all fake and they transferred millions of dollars outside the company and it was all AI-generated fake.

Peter Woolfolk: 20:07

Well, you know, obviously this is a huge problem and because it's so new, there probably are not ways that people particularly if you're just an ordinary citizen going through your day knowing what to do to double check it unless it appears to come from some reliable source and you can get in touch with that source to validate it. But outside of that, there just does not seem to be a way that people can double check it other than call some other people and ask them for help of some kind.

Jonathan Bernstein: 20:36

No, unfortunately, peter, the AI tools to generate new information are developing much more quickly than any countering force. It kind of again like happened in the early days of viruses and antivirus software. Antivirus software used to have a really hard time keeping up with all the viri that hackers would invent. It's gotten a lot better over the years, but I think we're kind of at the same stage with AI right now. We're going to be behind the eight ball for a while on any means of quickly fact-checking information that AI produces, because either that or you're just going to get people considering everything to be either treating everything that's true or everything that's false, and that won't help anybody either.

Peter Woolfolk: 21:28

Well, I guess the other thing that has to happen, or should happen, is that those people who are being tricked, if you will, or the organizations that are being misrepresented, once they find out, then they have to obviously take some initiative, not only want to correct it, but also let the public know that this is misinformation that they should disregard and come directly to the company, rather than depending upon some external source for certain information.

Jonathan Bernstein: 21:58

I agree, and also it's going to be interesting this is just occurring to me actually it's going to be interesting what the impact is of AI and the subject of defamation. If someone right now probably, and I'm not a lawyer, but in the business, I'm in, I have to know defamation law pretty well to avoid getting accused of defamation. Defamation law requires first that you knew the information was false at the time you released it and that it was done with malice. And that's malice, is the hardest part. Intent is hard to prove very hard to prove.

Jonathan Bernstein: 22:43

But that said, if you generate something from AI and publish it and you don't fact check it, do you have a responsibility? If it's inaccurate or false, does that constitute defamation? It's inaccurate or false? Does that constitute defamation? I think defamation lawyers are going to have fun with that one because it's going to happen. Somebody is going to say you know that, that you know so-and-so person committed this crime or did this, or had a relationship with small children, or whatever it is. It's horrible that they said they did and and here's our research from ChatGPT. And they just cut and paste ChatGPT right into a press release, right into a blog post, right into X or wherever, and it's out there and not 100% retrievable at that point. So what is the liability of someone for not bothering to fact-check something known to be factually inaccurate on a regular basis?

Peter Woolfolk: 23:56

So that says to me that people need to be on their toes, otherwise they'll have some good liability insurance to be on the safe side and the insurers are going to be pulling their hair out trying to figure out how to cover that.

Jonathan Bernstein: 24:14

So it's a science expanding so quickly that its uses and misuses have only barely been touched.

Announcer: 24:24

That's what.

Peter Woolfolk: 24:25

I'm afraid of. I mean, I see new things just like. Every week something new is coming up and it's getting to proportions that you know we hadn't even thought about or might not have been capable of thinking about. That that can't be done. So, jonathan, do you have any other good words that you can impart to us about this?

Jonathan Bernstein: 24:49

If you don't get on top of it. The biggest thing is if you're in the PR field. Even if you're not. If you're in the PR field, have someone available to you who knows this stuff and stays on top of it. If you're not in the PR field, get someone who understands this stuff and not just one part of it, but who looks at AI across the board. You know my specialty is crisis management, so I look at it from that perspective. But it's going to be critical for traditional business promotion too. It's going to be critical for traditional PR to build the value of a brand.

Jonathan Bernstein: 25:27

One big area I think it's going to have a huge risk in is investor relations, because what appears on the internet can change, for a publicly held company can really make a big difference for better or for worse and depending on what it is, and even if it's false, if a company is accused of doing something right away, it takes a hit. So you know that's the downside. The good side is, if you want to create a broad cushion of goodwill to get you through more crisis, ai will let you generate the copy at least the content much more quickly and much more regularly. So that you know everybody's always struggled over, you know, creating two, three, four blog posts a month, for example. Not a problem anymore. Creating two, three, four blog posts a month, for example.

Peter Woolfolk: 26:26

Not a problem anymore.

Peter Woolfolk: 26:29

You know, one of the things I said, as we sort of begin to get to the end of this, is that if, in fact, part of your job at your company is crisis communications, that you need to get with someone who has the experience. The idea of taking a class, you know you're sitting in a classroom or a hotel ballroom, there for a matter of hours and having somebody explain to you the different types of crisis communication here's some of the steps you can take to remediate the problem I think is a very, very short-sighted idea, because some things just you can't learn in the class. You have to learn by experience. You know what to do if there's a fire in your building. That's one thing. But if someone has, you know, something comes out in terms of that's created by artificial intelligence. You don't know what to do because your course didn't cover that. Somebody needs to at least begin to identify somebody that can help them, that has had some experience with problems when it comes to artificial intelligence. Otherwise they're going to have a major problem on their hands.

Jonathan Bernstein: 27:35

Yeah, I agree, and it's going to come down to some of us will be ready for that, some of us are ready for that and some will not be, but that will sort itself out very quickly. People will learn who can do? This and who can't, just like we did? I mean, I'm sure you've encountered this too. So many people claim expertise in search engine optimization. 10% actually know what they're doing. It's got to be the same way with AI.

Peter Woolfolk: 28:09

You know, I actually very, very briefly. I did a show several months back about some, I think some folks out of the college in Utah looked at PR companies that said that they were versed in certain topics I forget exactly what it was right now and they interacted with a lot of them. Some of them actually did have the experience. Others just used it as a marketing tool. Yes, you know we're great at doing A, b, c and D, but they really never done it, and so you need to be careful about things like that too. Ask for credentials. If you're looking for somebody that helps you at a certain thing, ask them for some credentials that you then can go and check to find out if they're valid.

Jonathan Bernstein: 28:53

Exactly. Yeah, I mean you wouldn't hire a brain surgeon without looking up their credentials and record a little bit. Crisis management is kind of the brain surgery of PR.

Peter Woolfolk: 29:04

Good Well, jonathan, you've been a great guest, as always. I just wonder if there are any closing remarks, anything that you think we've missed that we should hear about.

Jonathan Bernstein: 29:13

No, Peter, other than you know who was the famous football coach who said you know, now is today, or something like that. George Allen, I think, had something like that to say way back here Now is the time. This is. My message is now, you know, this is a good time. It's not too late yet to learn a whole lot more about AI and how it'll work with PR in general and if you're in my area in crisis management, Know what it can do, know what it can't do, and admit it if it doesn't make any sense to you, and find someone to whom it does make sense.

Peter Woolfolk: 29:51

Absolutely Well. Let me say again thank you to Jonathan Bernstein. He's the chairman and founder of Bernstein Crisis Communications. We certainly hope that you've enjoyed his presentation today and, of course, if you do, we'd like to get a review from you, and we'd also like for you to share this information with your friends and colleagues, and also for the next edition of the Public Relations Review. Join us, thank you.

Announcer: 30:20

This podcast is produced by Communication Strategies, an award-winning public relations and public affairs firm headquartered in Nashville, Tennessee. Thank you for joining us.