Finnish Newsroom's AI Tool Falsely Reports Russian Drones Entered Finnish Airspace
Published · updated · curated by AI Is Going Just Great
Source: generative-ai-newsroom.com ↗
"The rule is, of course, human-in-the-loop. But it was a very busy moment, so they just took the one line, put it out: 'Russian drones in Finland.'"
Helsingin Sanomat, one of Finland's leading news outlets, briefly published a story claiming Russian drones had entered Finnish airspace — a claim that was entirely fabricated by an AI press-release scanning tool misreading a Finnish Ministry of Defense release. The error was corrected three minutes later, but not before the false headline had gone out.
The newsroom's agreed process required a journalist to check the original source before publishing, but in a busy moment, someone trusted the AI summary and hit publish. "The rule is, of course, human-in-the-loop," Senior Editor-in-Chief Erja Yläjärvi explained at the International Journalism Festival in Perugia. "But it was a very busy moment, so they just took the one line, put it out: 'Russian drones in Finland.'" Sister publication Ilta-Sanomat also ran the error and issued its own apology — a reminder that AI-assisted workflows and geopolitical headlines are a combustible combination.