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As Gallup officials respond to recent flooding, they say an AI news outlet is getting in the way
Gallup-area officials said in addition to grappling with historic monsoon rains that recently flooded roads and damaged homes, they have also had to respond to a new artificial intelligence news outlet named Prism McKinley County that has published false and misleading information during the crisis.
For instance, within the last week, Prism published a story about a woman drowning in floods, but the death occurred last year, according to Matt Robinson, Gallup鈥檚 tourism and marketing manager. The misleading story caused people to believe the recent floods caused her death, he said. The recent flooding has not caused any deaths or injuries, according to city officials.
鈥淭hey鈥檙e taking things that happened years ago that are negative, bringing them to light, scaring people, and sharing false information,鈥� Robinson said. 鈥淚t鈥檚 really not a good thing.鈥�
Other misleading or false stories include one July 18 that reported that two women were robbed and beaten at a Walmart. The article goes on to say that the robbery actually occurred March 3, 2020, and Gallup Police Chief Erin Toadlena-Pablo told Source NM she does not know where the outlet got its information.
Still, the article received roughly 250 shares and dozens of comments, most of which decried security concerns at the Walmart, which is one of the main grocery stores in town.
The misleading posts prompted by the Gallup Police Department advising residents to use 鈥渧erified sources and/or official government channels to obtain the most dependable information.鈥�
Robinson told Source NM that city officials decided to warn the public about the news outlet during a meeting last week that was otherwise devoted to responding to the floods and a massive water main break.
Six additional Prism sites operate in New Mexico, according to the outlet鈥檚 website, though only three appear to have social media accounts. Prism McKinley County, which launched in October, has the largest following of any of them with roughly 7,400 Facebook followers.
Prism Media, an Israeli-based startup, first publicized its operations in May in a press release decrying the disappearance of local news outlets. Dekel Valtzer, who lists himself as Prism Media鈥檚 co-founder and CEO on LinkedIn, did not respond to Source NM鈥檚 request for comment.
Alex Mahadevan, the director of the Poynter Institute鈥檚 digital media literacy project, told Source NM he has been monitoring Prism鈥檚 growth across the country and said that the McKinley County example stands out because Prism appears to be basing its articles largely on Facebook posts.
Prism articles are unattributed, recycled and sometimes false, but in other areas it has launched the content is at least based on reporting from other news organizations or credible sources, Mahadevan said.
鈥淭his is an interesting case where it does seem like it must be an actual news desert, and so they don鈥檛 have good reporting to go off of,鈥� Mahadevan said of Prism McKinley County. 鈥淪o they are stuck with siphoning news from Facebook, which any of us who鈥檝e been on Facebook in the past 10 years knows is probably a bad idea.鈥�
The, the city鈥檚 longtime daily newspaper and main source for news, closed in February after more than a century of operation. The town currently has a weekly newspaper, the Gallup Sun, and a monthly community magazine, the Gallup Journey.
