January 31, 2026 14:41 (Japan time)
Fake news reports, fake information programs, and fake interview videos about election issues and political party policies are spreading on the Internet. Many are created by generative artificial intelligence.
Many of the articles support or criticize specific political parties, and this trend is evident in this House of Representatives election. Experts have warned that the video could be misleading to viewers.
In the video, which appears to be from a TV information program studio, an elderly woman can be seen yelling in Kansai dialect, saying, “It was Okada of the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan who started the fire with Mr. Takaichi’s Taiwan remarks. Give me a break,” and another person responded, “I see.”
This 15-second clip has racked up more than 3 million views on YouTube, despite the fact that the program depicted is completely fictional.
In fact, in November of last year, Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi expressed the view in the Diet to Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan member Katsuya Okada that the Taiwanese emergency could be recognized as an existential crisis requiring the exercise of the right of collective self-defense. This prompted a backlash from China.
The channel that posted the video has about 240 other videos that look like news or information programs. In total, these videos were viewed approximately 90 million times. Many of these videos are all created by AI and criticize the opposition, China, and the media.
The uploader, a 45-year-old man in the real estate industry in Osaka, told the Yomiuri Shimbun in a phone interview on Monday that he had no intention of deceiving or hiding anything.
This man had previously posted investment-related videos. During last fall’s Liberal Democratic Party presidential election, the AI video generator “Sora2” was used to create an AI-generated video of a 90-year-old woman talking about politics and elections. This caused his viewership to skyrocket.
The man adds his own thoughts to political news and topics and creates a video by inputting prompts such as “news program” into the AI.
Although he acknowledged that many of his videos are conservative because he is a supporter of Takaichi, he said, “I don’t intend to encourage people to vote for a particular political party. My purpose is to raise political awareness.”
AI is not written in the video title or channel name, but if you click on the description field, the word “ai” will be displayed.
A significant number of comments suggested that viewers considered the woman and the show to be real, with posts such as “Is she a former member of Congress?” or “I hope she lives a long life.”
However, the man insists that he is not lying. “I don’t think it’s a big deal,” he said.
interview style clip
Other videos produced by different individuals mimic street interviews.
A video posted to X on January 18 shows a woman criticizing the new centrist Reform Party, with a microphone pointed at her on the street. Viewed 450,000 times.
Another video that went viral on Wednesday shows someone saying, “I was very moved by Mr. Takaichi’s street speech.” It has been viewed over 1 million times.
Both were originally listed as being generated by AI when posted to YouTube, but were reposted to X with no indication of such. As a result, it spread as if it were a real program.
An image of a person who appears to be an expert or reporter giving an explanation in front of a monitor in a news-style program broadcast on X on January 20th.
The monitor displayed an unnatural sudden increase in the number of followers of a certain political party, as well as graphs and texts indicating “suspects of manipulation.” However, the image had a label indicating it was generated by AI.
Tsukasa Tanihara, an associate professor of social informatics at Ritsumeikan University, points out, “It feels like they are borrowing the authority of the mass media to stir up public opinion as if a particular opinion has gained support.It could give viewers a misunderstanding.”
