China is leveraging artificial intelligence to target voters in the United States, Taiwan, and other countries with disinformation campaigns, according to recent cybersecurity research from Microsoft and U.S. officials. The Wall Street Journal reports that Microsoft’s cyber-threat report, published on Friday, reveals that Chinese-linked online actors are using more advanced methods, including generative AI tools, to spread false information through fake social media accounts. These tactics aim to identify divisive domestic political issues and potentially influence elections in foreign countries. The report highlights that accounts on X/Twitter, some more than a decade old, began posting last year about topics such as American drug use, immigration policies, and racial tensions. In some cases, these posts relied on relatively rudimentary generative AI for their imagery and asked followers to share opinions about presidential candidates, potentially to gain insights into U.S. voters’ political views.

In Taiwan’s January presidential election, Microsoft detected a surge in the use of more sophisticated AI tools, including an AI-created fake audio clip of a former presidential candidate endorsing one of the remaining candidates. This marked the first time Microsoft’s researchers observed a nation-state actor using AI to attempt to influence a foreign election.

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