Unscrupulous Airbnb host tries to get $1,700 out of Redditor with AI-generated pic of overflowing toilet

There are few things that give me the heebie-jeebies more than overflowing toilets, burst pipes, and water damage. Ditto receiving a hefty, unexpected fee. So I wonder, how would it feel to be on the receiving end of both?

One Redditor can answer this question, though only thanks to the smoke and mirrors economy of digital manipulation. Apparently, they found themselves on the wrong end of an Airbnb host—"one of the biggest Airbnb companies of their state in Australia"—who attempted to get them to cough up $1,700 for an overflowed toilet, the evidence for which was, you guessed it, AI-generated.

So thanks, AI, in addition to making our precious PC memory very expensive, you've also made it very easy for people to attempt to fleece others using the humble commode.

Thankfully, it's AI that can also come to the rescue here, as Gemini is able to spot its own SynthID watermark in the fake image. …