Fake statistics stayed visible to ChatGPT after Google buried them, exposing an AI-search verification gap
A cheap content experiment turned invented data into live AI citations, referral traffic and institutional references.
A Peec AI researcher spent about $50 creating 50,000 fabricated statistics and reports that, seven months later, the site had logged more than 10,000 ChatGPT sessions and 72,000 ChatGPT-User requests in 30 days despite its near-disappearance from Google. More than 330 domains linked to the site, while its invented numbers reached an academic paper and bank research. The experiment shows how retrieval systems can create a distribution channel outside conventional search while laundering weak evidence into apparently authoritative information.