AI is fabricating citations in biomedical studies, researchers find

"When those fake references are making it into the literature, they will end up in those guidelines, and that's how doctors decide how to provide care for you,"

"Your doctor could be making decisions around treatment based on studies that never existed."

"Also troubling is that none of the mistakes Topaz and his team identified have been corrected or retracted, and could still be influencing patient care, he said."

"The rate of fake references showing up in published medical literature is growing,"

"Topaz added, noting that the number of such erroneous citations has grown 12-fold over the last three years. The fabricated references spanned nearly 3,000 academic papers."

An audit of millions of biomedical papers found more than 4,000 citations to studies that do not exist. Fabricated citations can undermine clinical guidelines that health care professionals use to decide treatments. Fake references can be incorporated into the literature and then into guidelines, leading doctors to base decisions on research that never existed. The identified errors have not been corrected or retracted, so they may still influence patient care. The rate of fake references appearing in published medical literature has grown 12-fold over three years. The fabricated citations appeared across nearly 3,000 academic papers, and an AI tool used for polishing a paper inserted a fake citation that passed multiple peer review layers before detection.

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