AI tools designed to help nature enthusiasts identify birds and plants are accidentally flooding scientific databases with 'fake' rare species sightings.
March 31, 2026
Original Paper
Assistive AI and Data Manipulation in Citizen Science
SSRN · 6368918
The Takeaway
Citizen science databases like eBird are vital for tracking biodiversity, but the 2021 AI boom led to a 22% surge in rare species reports in ecologically impossible areas. This 'deterrence-erosion' effect means that the very technology intended to democratize science is now overwhelming human experts with high-quality misinformation, potentially skewing global conservation priorities.
From the abstract
AI tools designed to help legitimate users may simultaneously lower the cost of fabrication. When the resulting fakes overwhelm fixed reviewer capacity, detection falls and fabrication rises further, a process I call a deterrence-erosion multiplier. I study this mechanism using eBird, the world's largest biodiversity database, exploiting the 2021 AI boom in Brazil. A triple difference design shows that rare species records in ecologically implausible areas rise by 22 percent while expert review