People lie to you. AI lies to you. It is inevitable. Lying is a very human trait and we have created an AI that behaves like us in that regard. But here’s the uncomfortable truth — neither the human nor the AI can do it for long if you refuse to stay ignorant.

There’s an old saying about mushrooms: kept in the dark and fed a steady diet of horse s**t. Funny when you say it out loud. Less funny when you realise it describes how millions of people consume information every single day.  It is even less funny if you have ever been the victim of an AI hallucination, scammer, liar or con-artist. 

The ecosystem of misinformation relies on specific archetypes. To protect your data, your finances, and your organization, you need to recognize the players who start the fire, and those who fan the flames.

So let’s talk about that.

Misinformation doesn’t begin with some shadowy global conspiracy. It begins with:

1. a joker sharing a fake story for laughs — until someone screenshots it and shares it without the punchline. 
2. a scammer who knows that fear and urgency short-circuit your critical thinking. 
3. a politician who bends facts just enough to stay technically deniable. 
4. a conspiracy theorist who genuinely believes 5G spreads a virus. 
5. an “insider” who sounds credible but can’t be verified.

None of them need a large budget. They just need you not to ask questions. And not to look behind their mask and disguise as ‘respectable’ business people or ‘naive’ countryfolk. You just need to buy their story.

And then the ‘story’, the amazing lie / ‘news’, travels. Your aunt forwards it in the family WhatsApp group. A celebrity with nine million followers posts it without checking. By the time the correction arrives, the original story / ‘news’ has lapped it three times.

Here’s what makes this moment different from and more urgent than every previous information crisis in history: AI has entered the supply chain. It can generate convincing text, realistic images, and authoritative-sounding sources at a scale and speed no human operation could match. The mushroom diet just got a Michelin-star kitchen behind it.

But the point I am making and is worth sitting with is this:  AI can only deceive you if you let it. The same is true of people. Our state of mind and emotional disposition aggravate the situation and impact on our susceptibility to the lie or the con.  

Ignorance is not a personality trait. It’s a choice. Sometimes a passive one, made through apathy, habit and convenience, but a choice nonetheless.  At other times, it can be stress-blindness triggered by a perceived or real threat to our survival. 

So what does the alternative look like?

It looks like pausing before you share the story or the information. Asking where that story originated and who benefits from you believing it. Cross-referencing across sources that don’t share the same editorial agenda. Understanding that the most dangerous misinformation rarely feels like a lie — it feels like confirmation of what you already suspected. Moreover, if the person  or the source selling you the information is familiar, friendly and knows you well then it is a really easy sell. If it’s your AI co-pilot, it may seem to know you better than you know yourself.  In such cases, you need to be even more careful and look for the “money trail”. Ask who benefits from this?

It looks like treating your attention as the finite, valuable resource it actually is.  In an era where generative AI can spin up convincing narratives in seconds and human algorithms favor outrage over fact, the burden of truth falls entirely on us. If we aren’t actively verifying where our information comes from, we are consenting to be manipulated.

AI is not the enemy of truth. Uncritical consumption is. And the antidote has always been the same: curiosity, scepticism, and the willingness to be wrong and update.

In the case of tempering offers that look too good to be true, give yourself a deliberate 24-hour or more as a cooling off period before making any decision. Pay close attention to your situational and emotional circumstances. Alarm bells should be going off if the individuals (potential scammers) involved are using “urgency and scarcity” to push you into making a quick decision before you lose the great opportunity they are offering.  They will say that this is a “once in a lifetime” opportunity and you must take advantage of it now or lose the possibility forever. 

You were born with a functioning mind. Use it. Mushroom life is a choice. So is the alternative.

The Leadership Takeaway

In business and in life, data integrity is your only shield against bad decisions. AI doesn’t just hallucinate on its own; it echoes the garbage data humans feed it.

Step out of the dark. Stop consuming information passively. Challenge the source, audit the intent, and stop letting the jokers, scammers, and celebrities dictate your reality.

Where are you getting your information today, and how do you know it’s reliable?

About Author

Fay Niewiadomski

I awaken leaders to purposefully discern the best way forward, with such clarity, that they find within themselves the courage, wisdom, and compassion to do what they never dared to do before.

I’ve been privileged to work closely with C-level officers, presidents, ministers, global chairpersons, diplomats, board members, senior business and political leaders, and their teams to successfully navigate complex, high-stakes situations and make sound business and personal decisions resulting in profound and lasting change.

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