The AI fitness instructors selling unreal gains

AI-generated characters are being used in misleading fitness advertisements that breach UK advertising rules, a BBC investigation has found. The ads promise rapid, unrealistic body transformations to sell app subscriptions [1]. The investigation uncovered numerous social media ads featuring fabricated instructors and scientifically implausible claims, such as looking 20 years younger or losing 40 pounds in one month [1]. Many failed to disclose that the people featured were not real [1]. Fitness expert David Fairlamb, who has 30 years of experience, called the trend "so wrong" and "so misleading," stating that such 28-day transformations "just doesn't happen" [1]. He and his daughter, Georgia Sybenga, warned that the idealised, artificial bodies could damage confidence and mental health, particularly among young people [1]. The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has received about 300 complaints involving AI-generated advertising in the past year, a number that is rising [1]. Adam Davison, the ASA's director of data science, said the regulator judges ads "on whether they're misleading or likely to be harmful," not simply on their use of AI [1]. The ASA has issued advice notices to the advertisers flagged in the BBC's investigation [1].