A member of Cork City Council has denounced as \u201ccowardly and despicable\u201d what he says is an AI poison pen campaign targeting him and a named public official.<\/p>\n
That campaign has taken the form of digitally altered council documents circulated around northside WhatsApp groups, playing on concerns around asylum seekers.<\/p>\n
The altered documents purport to show a proposal that the council seeks planning permission to develop a disused commercial premises as an International Protection Accommodation Service (Ipas) centre.<\/p>\n
The old Keating\u2019s Fitted Furniture building on Ballyvolane\u2019s Ballyhooly Rd has been idle for 25 years. At the January meeting of Cork City Council, a proposal was made that the council compulsorily purchase the property.<\/p>\n
John Maher, Labour Party city councillor for the north-east ward, proposed that the council buy the building and develop it as \u201ca shared space for business, community and residential\u201d use.<\/p>\n
Responding<\/p>\n
Responding, Cork City Council director of services for planning and integrated development Niall \u00d3 Donnabh\u00e1in said the council had engaged with the selling agent and consideration was being given to the \u201cpotential use for the entirety of the lands on which the property is constructed\u201d.<\/p>\n
That consideration, Mr \u00d3 Donnabh\u00e1in said, would include input from the directors of service at the council\u2019s housing directorate and its community and corporate affairs directorate, and would ultimately determine the council\u2019s level of interest in purchasing the property.<\/p>\n
However, doctored versions of Mr Maher\u2019s motion and Mr \u00d3 Donnabh\u00e1in\u2019s response were circulated recently across northside WhatsApp groups.<\/p>\n
Altered<\/p>\n
The altered motion reads: \u201cThat Cork City Council seeks planning permission to develop the old Keating\u2019s Fitted Furniture building on Ballyhooly Rd as an International Protection Accommodation Service (IPAS) centre for the accommodation of asylum seekers and refugees. (Proposer: Cllr. John Maher.)\u201d<\/p>\n
The altered response claims that the council\u2019s planning department \u201chas engaged with the relevant authorities regarding the potential development of the above referenced property as an IPAS centre\u201d.<\/p>\n
Mr Maher told The Echo the campaign was \u201ccowardly and despicable AI-generated false news that doesn\u2019t help one person in our community\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is disgusting to me that as a result of hitting a public rep that a professional staff member would be made a target,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
A spokesperson said Cork City Council was aware of \u201cinaccurate and misleading information\u201d
\n online in relation to the former Keating\u2019s site.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A member of Cork City Council has denounced as \u201ccowardly and despicable\u201d what he says is an AI…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":338627,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[220,218,219,79,61,60,80],"class_list":["post-338626","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-artificial-intelligence","tag-ai","tag-artificial-intelligence","tag-artificialintelligence","tag-cork-news","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-technology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/338626","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=338626"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/338626\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/338627"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=338626"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=338626"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=338626"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}