Massive pubic comment submission with generated AI

2025-02-19

On April 19, the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) found that 46 people who submitted 10 or more comments on the government's Basic Energy Plan, which calls for maximum use of nuclear power plants, contributed a total of 3,940 opinions to the public comments. The Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) believes that the 46 people who submitted at least 10 comments made use of artificial intelligence (AI), which can quickly create sentences with similar content by simply entering the abstract of the comment. The majority of the comments, about 10% of the total, were anti-nuclear appeals.

METI confirmed exchanges on X (formerly Twitter) and LINE where a draft pubic commentary was being prepared using a generative AI. We also found examples of multiple people working shifts.

Multiple posts with the same content included "Promote hydrogen power generation, oppose nuclear power generation" and "I am absolutely against restarting nuclear power plants and building new ones!!!!" The maximum number of posts by one person was 457.

If the public solicitation of opinions, which is intended to incorporate a variety of opinions, frequently generates a large number of submissions by AI, there is a risk that opinions that should be reflected in policy will be buried.

This is the kind of behavior that takes place, so we need to reiterate the message that quantity is not what matters.

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