Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1495870
6 maltatoday | WEDNESDAY • 29 MARCH 2023 NEWS NEWS Europol sends out ChatGPT warning on phishing, misinformation and cybercrime MATTHEW VELLA THE European police agency Europol has warned against the possible abuse of chatbots such as ChatGPT, the AI-powered 'Large Language Model' (LLM) that has taken the world by storm. In a report published Monday, Europol sent out a stark warn- ing that criminals will be able to use ChatGPT to create credible phishing stratagems, with more refined techniques to steal per- sonal and sensitive data, as well as cybercrime, propaganda or disin- formation. Europol said ChatGPT's ability to draft highly realistic text makes it a useful tool for phishing pur- poses. "The ability of LLMs to re-produce language patterns can be used to impersonate the style of speech of specific individuals or groups. This capability can be abused at scale to mislead poten- tial victims into placing their trust in the hands of criminal actors." The police agency also said that after from fraud and social engi- neering, ChatGPT excelled at pro- ducing authentic sounding text at speed and scale. "This makes the model ideal for propaganda and disinformation purposes, as it al- lows users to generate and spread messages reflecting a specific nar- rative with relatively little effort." Europol also said that in addi- tion to generating human-like language, ChatGPT was capable of producing code in a number of different programming languag- es. "For a potential criminal with little technical knowledge, this is an invaluable resource to produce malicious code. As technology progresses, and new models become available, it will become increasingly impor- tant for law enforcement to stay at the forefront of these develop- ments to anticipate and prevent abuse." The Europol Innovation Lab or- ganised a number of workshops on how criminals can abuse LLMs such as ChatGPT, as well as how it may assist investigators in their daily work. The Europol report raises aware- ness about the potential misuse of LLMs, to open a dialogue with Artificial Intelligence (AI) compa- nies to help them build in better safeguards, and to promote the development of safe and trustwor- thy AI systems. A large language model is a type of AI system that can process, ma- nipulate, and generate text. Training an LLM involves feed- ing it large amounts of data, such as books, articles and websites, so that it can learn the patterns and connections between words to generate new content. ChatGPT is an LLM that was de- veloped by OpenAI and released to the wider public as part of a research preview in November 2022. The current publicly accessible model underlying ChatGPT is capable of processing and gener- ating human-like text in response to user prompts. Specifically, the model can answer questions on a variety of topics, translate text, en- gage in conversational exchanges ('chatting'), generate new content, and produce functional code. As the capabilities of LLMs such as ChatGPT are actively being im- proved, the potential exploitation of these types of AI systems by criminals provide a grim outlook. MATTHEW VELLA PRIME Minister Robert Abela could be expecting Labour MP Rosianne Cutajar to step aside, as he gave comments outside the Au- berge de Castille where he put up a less-than-sturdy defence of his embattled MP. "At the Labour conference, I sent a clear message that this govern- ment should not allow the good of last decade in power be tar- nished by negative episodes... I am convinced that everyone recog- nises their responsibilities as MP, towards the parliamentary group, the Labour Party and the country as a whole," Abela said. The Labour MP, who was forced to resign from equality secretary after an ethics investigation de- tailing her role in a property bro- kerage for Tumas magnate Yor- gen Fenech, was back in the eye of scandal over the publication of her WhatsApp chats in 2019 with Fenech. Abela refused to outrightly say that he would keep Cutajar in the Labour parliamentary group. "No- body is greater than the party, or the country," Abela said when asked by The Times whether he should tell Cutajar to step down from the House. He said he had not spoken to the MP personally but underlined the fact that his public declarations, spoken as the prime minister, should read clearly. "Two years ago, on similar details related to those chats, it was decid- ed that Cutajar resigns from par- liamentary secretary, and she paid the political price. I understand that some details in the chats are new – I have been clear, everyone must shoulder their responsibili- ty." Abela said he still condemned the leak and publication of evi- dence that was within the control of the Criminal Court, as part of the charges brought against Fenech, accused of being the mas- termind in the Caruana Galizia as- sassination. Abela made reference to the fact that Cutajar was expecting a baby girl, now made public by the MP and her partner Daniel Farrugia in a Facebook post on her gen- der-reveal party, saying the Mark Camilleri publication was "vindic- tive". Camilleri is being sued for defamaton by the MP, over the contents of his book 'A Rentseek- er's Paradise'. The Council of Europe's par- liamentary assembly's (PACE) committee on rules of procedure had also voted in 2022 that there was a serious breach of its rules of conduct by Labour MP Rosianne Cutajar, when she failed to disclose a conflict of interest in speaking out against a public inquiry into the Caruana Galizia assassination. Cutajar – who has since resigned her position as Labour MP dele- gate to the PACE – was accused of breaching ethics by Dutch MP Pie- ter Omtzigt, for her close link with Yorgen Fenech when she used her seat at the Council of Europe to ar- gue against the public inquiry. A Standards inquiry by the Mal- tese parliamentary commissioner public standards for came on the back of reports in MaltaToday and the Times that Cutajar had been promised a brokerage fee from the sale of an Mdina palazzo to Fenech, the man accused of having masterminded the assassination of Daphne Caruana Galizia. PM on Yors and Ros chats: 'No MP bigger than party, or country' Prime Minister Robert Abela with Parliamentary Secretary Rosianne Cutajar at Auberge de Castille