Can news outlets survive influx of AI and stealing of data?

Julia Angwin, journalist and founder of Proof News, speaks during the session titled "Elevating Journalism to its Rightful Position" at the 2025 World News Media Congress hosted by the World Association of News Publishers in Krakow, Poland, May 5. From left are, Ladina Heimgartner, president of the World Association of News Publishers, Meera Selva, chief executive officer of Internews Europe, Martin Baron, former executive editor of The Washington Post and Angwin. Korea Times photo by Ahn Kyung-mo

Since the release of ChatGPT in 2022, artificial intelligence (AI) has taken center stage in the global media industry, generating discussions about its impact on journalism and the newsroom.

In the early stages of the chatbot’s introduction, news companies focused on defining AI itself. But after the fast spread of the OpenAI service and other AI services released by late-coming tech giants over the last three years, newsrooms are now forced to make a life-or-death decision about how the industry can integrate AI in the newsroom while upholding journalistic integrity and fighting fake news.

This year's World News Media Congress, hosted by the World Association of News Publishers (WAN-IFRA) in Krakow, Poland, explored these debates from May 4 to 6. While last year’s congress held in Copenhagen, Denmark, was centered on basic technical issues such as creating summaries and headlines and identifying false news, this year's discussions on AI were much broader, with topics critical to the industry amid growing threats of IT giants extracting data from the media.

“From an industry perspective, I worry the most about AI as turning all of us into basically workers who are just building data for a training model but not ever getting any of the monetization on our own websites or wherever our outlet is,” Julia Angwin, journalist and founder of U.S.-based Proof News, said in the session on May 5 titled “Elevating Journalism to its Rightful Position."

“In the U.S., so much of media consumption is filtered through the tech platforms,” she said, adding that ordinary news consumers have no access to the algorithms of media platforms such as TikTok and Instagram, which could potentially lead to suppression of expression.

She stressed that the industry needs to fight for information to retain freedom of expression.

“We need to combat this ... the information we need to know, whether it’s certain political views, are being suppressed on these outlets.”

Lucky Gunasekara, co-founder and CEO of Miso.ai, an artificial intelligence-driven search service provider, speaks during the session titled "How AI-driven Platforms Reshaping Referral Traffic and SEO Strategies" at the 2025 World News Media Congress hosted by the World Association of News Publishers in Krakow, Poland, May 6. Korea Times photo by Ahn Kyung-mo

Business insiders such as Lucky Gunasekara, co-founder and CEO of Miso.ai, an AI-driven search service provider, also shared the concerns that the data “theft” of AI companies obtained from partner crawlers and learning personal conversations is unregulated.

“When we talk to regulators right now, they are so behind. There's no way for you as the individual to know what they're doing with your data at this point,” Gunasekara said during a session titled "Advertising Disrupted: Is AI Reshaping the Playing Field?” on May 4, urging there is a need for disclosure of what the AI companies are doing.

He added that data stealing and thus the creation of untrustworthy hyperpersonalised content is “concerning.”

“(It) ends up creating hallucinations and uses private conversations for political and commercial advertisements,” he also said during a session titled “How AI-driven platforms reshaping referral traffic and SEO strategies,” on May 6, adding that it could amount to privacy disclosure and reputation harm to brands.

He urged the media industry to self-regulate and initiate making “open standards quickly” and “uphold the standard of basic minimum commitments" in order not to lose “huge amounts of consumer trust."

Participants gather at the 2025 World News Media Congress hosted by the World Association of News Publishers in Krakow, Poland, May 5. Korea Times photo by Ahn Kyung-mo

David vs Goliath fight or opportunities?

Even though some analysts, such as Barry Adams, SEO consultant of Polemic Digital, predicted that Google is ultimately going to take over the AI market because of its size, many also see opportunities in introducing AI assistants in the newsroom to save journalists from repetitive and tedious tasks. Large media companies such as Reuters and Financial Times are actively introducing their own AI services in their content management systems.

“We all work in very similar ways … we are all time-pressed and resource-pressed,” Jane Barrett, head of Reuters AI Strategy, said during a session titled “AI in the Newsroom: Supporting Journalism,” on May 6.

Reuters has been widely introducing AI-assistant services such as Fact Genie, a summary tool, and Leon, a headline assistant. It is developing new features to process press releases in multiple languages, helping reporters quickly extract useful information from large volumes of data, as well as tools for video transcription and content shortlisting.

Ryan Y. Kellett, a journalist who worked for Axios and The Washington Post, and who is currently a Nieman-Berkman Klein fellow for Journalism Innovation at Harvard University, speaks during the session “From Audience to Community," at the 2025 World News Media Congress hosted by the World Association of News Publishers in Krakow, Poland, May 6. Korea Times photo by Ahn Kyung-mo

Journalism to back to its core

Facing a series of challenges, journalists highlighted the importance of engaging with audiences and refocusing on going back to the basics of journalism.

“It ultimately is about building trust,” said Ryan Y. Kellett, a journalist who has worked for Axios and The Washington Post and is currently a Nieman-Berkman Klein fellow for Journalism Innovation at Harvard University, during a session titled “From Audience to Community" on May 5.

He also shared a fact sheet showing that more consumers are getting their news from social media or influencers and creators, even though they are not sure about its sources.

Stressing that those creators can be seen as more transparent and trustworthy than legacy media by sharing everything they've researched and engaging with audiences, he urged traditional journalists to learn from them to survive changing audience trends.

“If an influencer can do it, why can't you as a news organization? … Create your audience future," he said.

Martin Baron, the award-winning journalist from The Washington Post who is now retired, stressed the importance of audience engagement, which the legacy media has been mostly missing.

“We should face the nasty fact that we are not communicating effectively with the public and other people,” Baron said during the session titled “Elevating Journalism to its Rightful Position" on May 5, while adding that independent content, such as YouTubers, TikTok creators and Substack newsletter publishers, put significant effort into responding to their audiences to create a sense of community.

“We have to find a way to do that so that we can be successfully communicating the information that people need and deserve to know about their society,” he said.

The author of this article attended the 2025 World News Media with funding from the Korea Press Foundation.