'Time' Posts Hidden Ads Only Chatbots Can See

Time Magazine is placing hidden advertisements on some web pages to confuse the chatbots that make up the majority of traffic on the internet, Seeking Alpha reports. A German software developer discovered that the Time website has ads hidden in the markdown versions of pages that are visible only to AI crawlers. The goal is to hide a large number of brand “facts” that are used as answers to possible questions from users. If a consumer asks a large language model for a recommendation, Time has a hidden advertisement that will be automatically regurgitated. This may be more effective than advertising directly to consumers.