The family of a former Formula 1 champion who suffered a skiing accident want to sue a German magazine that allowed itself to publish an artificial intelligence-generated fake interview entitled “Michael Schumacher: The First Interview”.
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“My life has changed completely since then [l’accident]. It was a horrible time for my wife, children and family. I was so badly injured that I was in a kind of artificial coma for months because otherwise my body wouldn’t have endured everything,” former Formula 1 champion Michael Schumacher is said to have reported to the magazine “Die Aktuell” on Thursday.
On the cover of the latest issue of the German magazine, the racing driver, who has not been seen in public since a seriously injured skiing accident in 2013, poses smiling next to the headline “Michael Schumacher: The first interview”.
“It looked deceptively real,” the news agency said in the caption.
But the quotes were reinvented from the ground up, generated from the ground up by artificial intelligence software, the magazine confirmed at the end of the article.
A spokesman for Schumacher’s family told Portal the family plans to take legal action against the magazine over the fake interview.
Since the accident, the family has been fighting tooth and nail to protect the champion’s privacy.
“Private is private, like he always said. It is very important to me that he can continue to enjoy his privacy as much as possible. Michael has always protected us, and now it’s us who protect Michael,” his wife Corinna Schumacher said in a 2021 Netflix documentary.
His son Mick Schumacher is currently a reserve driver at Mercedes.