Meta AI misidentifies current US President, company initiates emergency fix
What's the story
Meta's artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot has been misidentifying the current US President.
Despite Donald Trump's swearing-in on January 20, the AI continued to identify Joe Biden as the incumbent president.
The blunder was unearthed when Reuters tested the service and asked Meta AI. The chatbot said, "The current president of the United States is Joe Biden. However, according to the most recent information available, Donald Trump was sworn in as the president on January 20, 2025."
Urgent action
Meta's emergency response to AI chatbot error
The misidentification problem was flagged as urgent by Meta, leading the company to take swift action. This is called a SEV or "site event" at the company.
A source familiar with the matter told Reuters that this wasn't a one-off case but one of the many emergencies related to the US presidential transition that Meta has had to deal with this week.
Official statement
"AI systems sometimes return outdated results"
In response to the issue, Meta spokesperson Daniel Roberts told Reuters: "Everyone knows the President of the United States is Donald Trump. All generative AI systems sometimes return outdated results, and we will continue to improve our features."
However, he did not elaborate on what emergency measures were taken by Meta to fix this specific issue.
Additional incidents
Other issues faced by Meta during presidential transition
Apart from the AI chatbot error, Meta also faced other issues during the US presidential transition.
In one such case, users were forced to re-follow profiles of Trump, Vice President JD Vance, and First Lady Melania Trump on Facebook and Instagram, even after unfollowing them.
The issue occurred due to a lengthy transfer process of official White House social media accounts to new administration control.
Information
Instagram blocked searches for #Democrat(s)
Another issue arose when Meta's Instagram blocked searches for #Democrat and #Democrats for some users, while #Republican searches worked normally. A Meta spokesperson acknowledged the problem on Tuesday, clarifying that it impacted "various hashtags on Instagram, not just those associated with the left."