Narrative laundering

A claim is typically born on a low-credibility site, given a "human" face through a staged video or fake whistleblower, amplified across social platforms, and — if it works — eventually repeated by genuine commentators who treat it as established. Each hand-off strips away the original source and adds a layer of apparent legitimacy, the same way dirty money is cleaned by passing it through intermediaries.

AI accelerates every stage: it can mass-produce the originating articles, generate the corroborating media, and power the accounts that amplify them.

The defence is source discipline — tracing a striking claim back to its actual origin rather than trusting the most recent, most respectable-looking outlet to repeat it.