Katy Perry being dropped into the Met Gala. Shrimp Jesus breaking Facebook. The Pope in a puffer jacket.  Glue to help the cheese stick to pizza. Research papers containing the phrase “as an AI language model.” Outdated healthcare information on Alzheimer’s drugs and hepatitis deaths. Every week brings a fresh onslaught of fakery, increasingly generated by artificial intelligence (AI) tools. Accompanying it is a deluge of bot traffic – where automated applications visit websites, inflate post engagement, or steal sensitive information. 

AI is changing everything we do online. Already a mainstay of backend functions such as search results, social media feeds, and solicitous advertising, its tentacles are now beginning to replace human interaction online. 

Now, Imperva reports that bots account for almost 50% of all internet traffic.

It’s impossible to offer a similarly authoritative statistic for AI-generated content, in part because it’s so hard to distinguish what’s been spat out by tools such as Google Gemini and ChatGPT or by social media AI avatars from the likes of TikTok and Instagram. 

This month, media watchdog NewsGuard identified 957 unreliable AI-generated news websites operating with little or no human oversight across 16 languages, including English and Arabic.

Timothy Shoup, a futurist, has estimated the internet could be completely unrecognizable as early as next year, with 99% to 99.9% being AI-generated slime by 2025 to 2030. In other words, the 4chan conspiracy, which is the Dead Internet Theory, may well become our reality.

So far, so scary. Consumers are daily reminded to navigate social media more critically, suspect everything, and continue to educate themselves. 

But what does that mean for business? Some companies see AI as a way to cut manpower costs, but could synthetic content and traffic also eat into their business? How can companies reach their goals when their audience comprises digital crickets?

DOING BUSINESS IN ZOMBIE INTERNET

Experts say embracing AI without a strategic, data-backed plan could be a double-edged sword, and regional businesses, while eager to cash in on an AI economy, have already begun to feel the pain.

“Positively, AI can help extend the reach of the brand. Negatively, competitors could always use AI to create fake reviews to tarnish a brand’s reputation,” says Salih Ismail, Discipline Lead – Information Technology at Murdoch University Dubai.

The increasing dominance of AI content and traffic presents opportunities and challenges for organizations, agrees Thomas Pramotedham, CEO of Presight. “It allows automation, efficiency enhancement, and wider audience reach but also raises concerns about authenticity, trust, and brand reputation.”

In January, the WEF’s Global Risks Report identified AI-generated synthetic content as a key factor in spreading misinformation and disinformation and as the leading threat to business.

Even brand awareness can be affected. For example, consider the rise of insidious made-for-advertising (MFA) websites. These sites use click bait, catchy headlines, and controversial content to boost page views and rely on programmatic software to buy and sell online ad space. Because MFA sites are optimized for revenue over site content, their ads barely impact consumer behavior. 

Therefore, brands buying digital advertising should closely review purchase strategies, says Omar Othman, Head of Client Services and Global Media Factory at the AI-native marketing and growth company Webidoo MEA. “MENA businesses are heavily reliant on digital ads and face substantial risks, with bots inflating engagement metrics and depleting advertising budgets.”

He says fraudulent traffic wastes 30% of digital ad spend globally annually, citing the authenticator DoubleVerify. That’s a loss of $1.44 billion to non-human traffic in the MENA region, undermining campaign effectiveness and returns on investment.

“The region’s digital landscape, characterized by high mobile usage and diverse regulations, exacerbates these challenges. Mobile web traffic shows a lower invalid rate (7.9%) compared to desktop environments (32.6%),” Othman adds.

PUTTING LABELS ON CANNED CONTENT

At the top end, major players recognize that the proverbial stables are filthy. In May, TikTok began labeling AI-generated content with the Content Credentials digital watermark. It was already tagging videos made with AI effects. Amazon limits Kindle self-publishing uploads to three per day and requires creators to say if they used AI. Meta recently expanded its Made with AI and Imagined with AI labels for video, audio, and image content. Google began penalizing sites with low-quality AI-generated content in a March algorithm update. 

BALANCING ACT

Brands using AI-generated content will need to comply or risk user displeasure. Ayman Itani, founder of Dubai-based business advisory Think Media Labs, says to take the culture marketing route and emphasize in-person interactions.“Organizations can create culture-specific engagement activities, making the interactions and comments by real users stand out.”

“Organizations can bypass AI-generated content by focusing on direct engagement activities by encouraging user-generated content, offering exclusive loyalty programs, engaging in two-way communication with customers, and personalized email campaigns can help grow communities of real human audiences,” he adds.

While automating away entire teams is tempting, only people can handle some problems. “Hybrid interaction of automated AI chatbots with the feature of humans having the ability to get involved at the right point would be vital,” Ismail says. 

Then, enterprise IT staff will have a stronger role, Ismail says. Regular audits remain important. Likewise, consider implementing bot detection tools such as the “I’m not a robot” reCAPTCHA risk analysis service.

Some businesses will need industry-specific programs. For example, Othman says that media can look to advanced bot detection tools for pre-bid filtering, attention metrics for genuine engagement assessment, and post-campaign brand lift surveys to distinguish between bot-driven and human engagement.

Finally, remember to leave space for creativity.

“To turn AI into a competitive advantage, companies should use AI to automate routine tasks, freeing time for strategic thinking. Secondly, they should leverage AI for personalized marketing, using data analysis to understand customer behavior and preferences. Lastly, companies should ensure their teams understand how to use these tools effectively,” says Pramotedham.

“Companies need to focus on quality over quantity, using advanced analytics to discern between bot and human traffic, and targeting their efforts towards genuine human audiences.”

As AI tools surge in popularity – including Arabic content after the recent launch of the Jais large language model – Pramotedham adds, “The key is to approach it strategically, ethically, and with a focus on enhancing human capabilities.”