An AI-assisted paper on Z-Library cites sources that may not exist
TorrentFreak found that at least 10 of 44 references in a recent peer-reviewed paper about Z-Library could not be located, including a nonexistent TorrentFreak article. The authors disclosed using Consensus AI to sift literature and ChatGPT to improve language; the publisher says its ethics team is investigating.
That does not establish that AI generated the bad citations: TorrentFreak says it cannot confirm the cause, and it notes that AI-detection tools can produce false positives. The two-comment HN thread questioned whether fabricated citations are still novel and broadened the criticism to academic publishing, rather than offering independent verification of the article’s findings.