OpenAI said October 8 it had banned two covert influence operations that used ChatGPT to support "false front" entities. The Russia-origin operation was assessed at Category 5 on OpenAI's IO Breakout Scale — the first Category 5 disruption it has ever reported — while the Iran-origin operation was rated Category 4.

The Iranian campaign ran seven fake journalist personas that pitched long-form articles to small and medium outlets worldwide. The Russian operation appears to have co-opted unwitting people in Latin America to run a self-styled research platform on the ground. Both used false fronts to launder geopolitical and conflict-related messaging into target audiences, according to OpenAI's safety report.

OpenAI said it has now exposed 30 covert influence operations over the past two and a half years, and that operations landing real media placements — like these — have the highest potential reach.