In the department of how AI might be involved in bringing about the end of the world:
The report, according to one of the sources, was “entirely false.” But it also “almost started a war,” the source said. Any US operation against a Chinese vessel could have risked spiraling into an armed conflict between the two nations.
[…]
Analysts have long feared that AI could lead to a catastrophic miscalculation if nation states are relying on poor or corrupted data — the kind of miscalculation that might lead the United States to fire on a Chinese ship based on inaccurate information.
Exclusive: US military had close call after using AI for false intelligence report, sources say, by Katie Bo Lillis, Zachary Cohen.
This is terrifying in its implications.