Meta Paid Contractors to Pose as Teens and Trick Competitor AI Chatbots

Mon, 06 Jul 2026 00:00:00 +0800

Meta has been running a covert operation where hundreds of contract workers pretend to be children online, probing how rival AI chatbots handle high-risk topics — self-harm, suicide, even sexual abuse.

The project, codenamed “Cannes,” was detailed in internal Meta documents and confirmed by five people familiar with the effort. It ran at least through April 21, managed by Covalen, an outsourcing firm Meta uses. The targets: OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Google’s Gemini — along with Character.AI.

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Meta Paid Contractors to Pose as Teens and Trick Competitor AI Chatbots