When #AI tools hallucinate citations, their made-up author names are not random. "We show that #LLMs do not merely default to high-probability individual names when generating fictional experts: they produce correlated character ensembles, pairs and trios [of co-authors] whose co-occurrence rates far exceed chance and are consistent across independent generations."
arxiv.org/abs/2606.02184

They fool people and tools:

"We identify 1,655 ghost-authored records claiming nonexistent journals with fabricated publication dates…Server-side #DataCite timestamps prove deliberate backdating…These carry real #DOIs…making them harvestable by any scholarly aggregator that ingests DOI metadata."

#Citations #Hallucinations #ScholComm

The Ghost Couple: Correlated LLM Name Priors and Their Haunting of the Web and Academic Publishing

These names do not exist. Elena Vasquez and Marcus Chen have appeared as volcano experts, astronauts, thriller protagonists, podcast hosts, and academic co-authors across hundreds of independently produced AI-generated documents, never having lived.

^arXiv.org

"A senior judge has accused the Home Office of relying on “AI hallucinated” information to refuse an asylum claim.

The case relates to a Moroccan woman and her child who fled her country after experiencing forced underage marriage and extreme violence, including rape. The woman claimed asylum on the basis of fears that she would be killed by her husband: a powerful, previously convicted criminal.

The Home Office refused her case, citing evidence from a supposedly independent and authoritative document known as a country policy information note (CPIN), which they said confirmed that Morocco would be safe for her.

But the document could not be found, although its existence was relied upon by a judge who rejected her appeal against the Home Office’s refusal decision in an immigration court known as the first-tier tribunal."

theguardian.com/uk-news/2026/j…

#UK #AI #GenerativeAI #Hallucinations #AsylumSeekers #HomeOffice

Home Office used ‘AI hallucinated’ information to refuse asylum claim, judge suggests

Upper tribunal unable to find document cited in case and claims it is ‘analogous to relying on bogus evidence’

^{Diane Taylor (The Guardian)}