Berliner Boersenzeitung - AI Bots and Plagiarism: How Philadelphia and New Jersey News Sites Are Using Fake Content

A group of local news websites operating in Philadelphia and New Jersey has come under scrutiny for allegedly using artificial intelligence to generate content and publishing stories under the bylines of journalists who have long since left their respective companies. The discovery, made by Billy Penn, has raised serious questions about the integrity of digital journalism in the region and the extent to which automated tools are being used to mimic legitimate news reporting.

Steven Bassin, a former sports reporter for centraljersey.com, recently noticed his name attached to a story about Lionel Messi published on the site just days prior. Bassin had not worked for the company in nearly four years, yet his byline appeared prominently on the article. "I haven’t worked there, like I said, for three years," Bassin said. "It’s going to be four years this January. I now see a story done (recently) on Lionel Messi with my name on it, and clear as day, I don’t work there anymore. I, clear as day, didn’t write this story, so I don’t know why I’m being used there."

Bassin also observed that his author profile photo, along with that of his former coworker Mark Rosman, had been replaced with images of different individuals. "It’s kind of ridiculous that they have Mark and me as totally different people and that we’re still on their page as well," Bassin said. He noted that the photos listed were not of him or Rosman, but of strangers who bore no resemblance to them.

This incident is part of a broader pattern identified by Billy Penn over several months. The investigation focused on multiple local news websites, including Northeast Times, Lower Bucks Times, South Philly Review, and centraljersey.com. What began as a check on one site led to a "local news rabbit hole" that questioned the reality of the content being published.

At least three journalists associated with centraljersey.com had stories under their author pages that they did not write, along with photos that were not of them. One of these individuals is Ken Downey Jr., a reporter for WHYY. When shown his author page on centraljersey.com, Downey stated, "That’s not me." The photo displayed on the site showed a man who looked approximately the same age as Downey and wore similar glasses, but it was clearly not him. "That is my name associated with my former publication," Downey explained. "That is a bio that looks pretty accurate about myself, but that is not my picture. These two top articles; those are not my work. They are dated as recent as of this year. I haven’t been associated with the company in almost a full seven years."

Downey further clarified the discrepancy in the photos, noting, "Mark Rosman is an older, smaller Jewish man who is white, and this picture is a younger Black man. So I know for a fact that is not Mark." The confusion extended to other former employees as well. Andrew Martins, who has not written for any of the Central Jersey papers since 2018, found his most recent byline on the website attached to a story published on July 30. "As someone’s currently in the job market and in this line of work, my byline is incredibly important, and to see my byline not just be used in a new way, but also to not have my actual photo there, it’s just extremely disconcerting," Martins said.

Martins, a four-time New Jersey Press Association Award winner, expressed frustration that his award-winning articles were no longer accessible on the site. "Most of my work is gone, and if it’s supposed to be a record of what happened in these communities, it’s doing an extreme disservice to those communities," he said. It was unclear which people listed on Central Jersey’s author page were current reporters and which were not.

The investigation deepened when Billy Penn reporter Meir Rinde noticed a peculiar similarity between his work and an article published on northeasttimes.com in July. The story, part of Billy Penn’s city guide series focusing on the Bustleton and Somerton neighborhoods, had been replicated by Northeast Times with strikingly similar language. Billy Penn’s original text read: "The neighborhoods of Bustleton and Somerton in Northeast Philadelphia, along the city’s border with Montgomery and Bucks counties, have been called ‘Little Odessa’ for their large numbers of residents who are immigrants from Russia, Ukraine, and other parts of Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union." Northeast Times published a version that stated: "The neighborhoods of Bustleton and Somerton, tucked along Philadelphia’s border with Montgomery and Bucks counties, are home to at least 43,000 immigrants born in Russia, Ukraine and other parts of Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union. The concentration is dense enough that the area has earned the nickname ‘Little Odessa.’"

Beyond the similar opening paragraphs, Northeast Times reporter Ellen Kowalczyk used the exact same quotes as Billy Penn without attributing them to Rinde or WHYY. An investigation into Kowalczyk revealed a vague bio claiming she was a "longtime resident" who "followed the area’s growth for years," with no mention of her education or prior work experience. She had no visible online presence, such as LinkedIn or social media accounts. Furthermore, her profile photo appeared to be AI-generated. The image showed Kowalczyk smiling gently on an unknown Philadelphia street, with nearly identical brick rowhomes and gray cars lining the block. The fence lines appeared to bleed into each other, and a large tree seemed to sprout from the street behind her head. Billy Penn ran the photo through Hive Detect, an AI detection tool, which determined the image was 99.9% likely to be AI-generated.

Similar red flags were found with other reporters on the Northeast Times site, including culture reporter Maya Brooks, public safety reporter Ray Doyle, and community reporter Pat Nowak. Their bios were vague, they lacked internet presence beyond their journalism work, and their photos could not be ruled out as AI-generated. When Billy Penn contacted the company behind the site for comment, the website’s content changed within 24 hours.

As of November 9, Northeast Times insisted it did not use AI in its reporting, stating that a "human answers for every piece" and that they used "no fake photos." However, further investigation revealed at least 10 stories on the site that mimicked reporting from Billy Penn, WHYY, The Philadelphia Inquirer, Philly Mag, The Philly Citizen, and 6abc. An article about a free arts program closely mirrored reporting from the Philadelphia Citizen. Unattributed quotes were taken from an Inquirer article about a Northeast deli closure, and the sandwich photo in the Northeast Times version appeared manipulated. Another article about tools to prevent unwanted AI was seemingly reworded, with identical language used:

WHYY: "Rather than treating AI as an abstract concept, the workshops focus on practical skills, from explaining technical terminology to showing participants how AI tools actually work and what they can and cannot do."

Northeast Times: "Rather than treating AI as an abstract concept, the workshops focus on practical skills, from explaining technical terminology to showing participants how AI tools actually work and what they can and cannot do."

Many main images on stories appeared to be AI-generated or manipulated. Images of the Philadelphia skyline or City Hall were unattributed and looked altered. Billy Penn also found photos taken by its own reporters, such as Nick Kariuki, on Northeast Times stories without authorization.

The issue extended beyond Northeast Times. Other local news websites connected to papers owned by Donnelly Media raised similar questions. On Lower Bucks Times, author Tyler Dunphey’s photo showed a coffee shop behind him that did not appear to exist online, with different logos on the window and sign. South Philly Review also appeared to use AI-generated images, and its authors seemed suspicious. Star News Philly was writing about a massive snowstorm in Philadelphia despite no such storm being forecasted. New reporters on these sites seemed to be generating over 10 stories in a single day.

Northeast Times, established in 1932, is part of a larger network owned by Donnelly Media. In 2016, Richard Donnelly of Donnelly Distribution bought the Northeast Times papers and a majority interest in Packet Media LLC, parent company of centraljersey.com and The Princeton Packet. He rebranded Donnelly Distribution to Newspaper Media Group, which also operates as Donnelly Media. The company currently owns over 20 publications in the Philadelphia and New Jersey area, including Lower Bucks Times and South Philly Review. Sean Donnelly, Richard’s son, is now CEO following his father’s death in 2018.

Bassin attempted to reach out to former colleagues at Newspaper Media Group to resolve the issue of his byline being used without permission but received no response. Since speaking with Billy Penn, more articles have appeared under Bassin’s name, including over 30 published between November 3 and November 9 on topics far from his sports beat, such as betting sites. "When you click on centraljersey.com all my stories are front and center that I’ve not written," Bassin said. "It’s bad. I’m very frustrated, very upset. I’m very worried that something could affect me from that."

Donnelly Media initially claimed it did not own the website domains in question. Brandon Chamberlain, general manager at Donnelly Media, stated that Paradise Media was the company to contact. "We sold some of our domains to them (around) 2023 and 2024," Chamberlain said. "and we sold not only the domains but the existing content as well." He explained that Donnelly Media was undergoing a rebrand and thought the sale would help digital revenue, which was struggling. The agreement was understood to be an archive site where current writers’ content would live on unchanged. However, websites like patimes.media and centraljersey.media, affiliated with local print editions, are now owned by Paradise Media, a company based in Puerto Rico and Malta that describes itself as bringing "fresh thinking to digital marketing." Paradise Media is also known for turning Philadelphia Weekly into a "zombie site," according to Axios.

As of November 9, some Paradise Media sites still listed Donnelly Media as their owner. Chamberlain admitted, "Hindsight being the way it is, we’re not sure we would go down the same route. Because it just does confuse the readers." He noted that current Donnelly Media reporters, including PA Times Media editor Tom Waring, have also had stories listed under their names that they did not write. "We’ve been able to deal with everything on a case-by-case basis," Chamberlain said. "So when a call comes in, we deal with it swiftly. We explain what exactly the issue is, and we reach out to the contact at Paradise, and … generally, they take the story down."

Chamberlain suspected AI was involved, citing incorrect information and suspicious photos. "I don’t know where their employees are, or even if there are employees," he said. He claimed the problems were decreasing and that Donnelly Media had not lost sales. "None of our writers want to take credit for anything that is not theirs," Chamberlain added. "Especially since many things posted on those sites are inaccurate." However, he acknowledged that the companies could do a better job distinguishing themselves.

Bassin remains upset with Donnelly Media for selling the site without resolving the issue. "I’ll be honest with you, it makes me feel taken advantage of even more," he said. "This should have been taken care of a long time ago." He argued that people are still being affected by the sale and questioned why Donnelly Media had not shut it down. "If they’re getting any money off of what I’m doing, or what they’re saying I’m doing, I should actually get money from that," Bassin said. "I would just like them to be called out for what they’re trying to do and trying to portray people as other people when they’re not."

Alex Mahadevan, a faculty member specializing in AI and AI policy at the Poynter Institute, noted that ethical AI use requires transparency and accountability. "Ethical AI use is thinking about a newspaper’s values, or thinking about journalism’s values, like transparency, accountability and doing no harm, and using AI within those frameworks that align with values that we hold dear as journalists," Mahadevan said. He highlighted that AI-generated text is where the line is often drawn. "That’s sort of where we’ve drawn the line is AI writing, and so I think that’s sort of the next big ethical question that is out there."

Mahadevan has observed AI usage in local papers such as The Cleveland Plain Dealer, McClatchy, Prism News, and Nota News. "It’s everywhere," he said. "It is literally in every community in the entire country; there are AI-generated newspapers that are popping up." He noted that while some argue AI helps summarize press releases for understaffed areas, many of these outlets appear in areas with existing news resources. "(AI models) are good at modeling language, but they’re not good at writing," Mahadevan said. "They model language. It’s what a paragraph looks like, but it’s not how a paragraph is actually written."

He warned that AI tools are hard to control and can lead to plagiarism. "You cannot just automate a news site," Mahadevan said. "You can’t do it. You cannot do it. And so when people try to do it, it just ends up plagiarizing a real news site to try to look like a news site." He questioned the profitability of such sites, calling them "defective products" that may be used to sell advertising or collect data.

Legally, Mahadevan said it is imperative for audiences to receive disclosure when AI is used. Regarding fake photos and author names, he noted the difficulty in resolution. "If some AI tool stole a story that I wrote, and then put my name on it, or rewrote it and put my name on it, I could send a takedown request because there’s a copyright issue there, but newsrooms (usually) aren’t resourced enough to sue over these types of things, and there’s such a high bar because we have the First Amendment and it’s hard to prove that type of thing in court," he said. He expressed hope that seeing the discrepancies would make people value legitimate local news.

The Northeast Times updated its AI policy on Tuesday morning, stating that reporting from its "AI-assisted team" may not be 100% accurate. Bylines for reporters like Ellen Kowalczyk were replaced with "AI News Team." However, by Tuesday afternoon, this language was removed, and bylines were changed to "NewsDesk." Paradise Media did not respond to requests for comment.

The challenges facing small papers continue to rise. In September, Kensington Voice laid off its team and stopped publishing new articles. ArtBlog, which profiled Philly’s local arts scene, shut down in June 2025. Many of the Paradise Media news sites associated with Philadelphia and Jersey have a more national focus, such as international politics or celebrity news, topics that Martins said do not represent the communities they are supposed to be covering.

Martins expressed disappointment in the direction of local news. "Companies need to realize that more goes into crafting a piece of news," he said. "It’s not just letters and punctuation and turns of phrase, but it’s the people that do the work. It takes time. It takes effort. It takes skill, and it’s very hard to live in a world in this profession where people think that content has no purpose." He criticized articles whose main purpose seemed to be selling advertisements, such as one written under his byline about Wall Street. "The first thing that really strikes me as someone who used to do community journalism is, while the Dow and the stock market are incredibly important to the overarching economy, this story does nothing to help inform the community," he said.

Martins wished these local news sites could return to serving their communities. "Local news is supposed to be the history book of communities," he said. "To see this done this way, it’s extremely galling." He added, "What I wish was that there would be more that people would remember that the content that we write or did write in these papers is important, regardless of whether it was written in 2011 or 2026. This needs to be a record of what happened and what went down to keep not just that information alive, but to remind people of what mattered to these communities."

Mahadevan emphasized the distinction between human and AI reporting. "If someone asks ChatGPT, ‘What is this new development that’s going up across the street?’ somebody has to have done that reporting," he said. "Somebody has to have asked about it. Someone has to have pulled the development." The content AI pulls from is already out there because of the work of reporters.

An editor’s note clarified that Paradise Media changed the content of some websites after Billy Penn reporters reached out for comment on November 9. Many stories without attributed photographers or authors remained up at the time of publication. Archived versions of the Northeast Times, Lower Bucks Times, Star News Philly, South Philly Review, and CentralJersey.com are available on web.archive.org.

(Y.Berger--BBZ)