Matt Burgess Security May 6, 2026 11:49 AM Cybercriminals Are Complaining About AI Slop Flooding Their Forums It's not just you. Hackers and other cybercriminals are complaining about “AI shit” flooding platforms where they discuss cyberattacks and other illegal activity. Photo-Illustration: Jobanny Cabrera; Getty Images Save this story Save this story The complaint sounds familiar. “I’m disappointed that you are working to incorporate AI garbage into the site,” one annoyed person, posting anonymously, said in an online message. “No-one is asking for this—we want you to improve the site, stop charging for new features.” Only, this is not a regular internet user moaning about AI being forced into their favorite app . Instead, they are complaining about a cybercrime forum’s plans to introduce more generative AI. Like millions of others, scammers, grifters, and low-level hackers are getting annoyed about AI encroaching into their lives and the rise of low-quality AI slop being posted in their online communities. “People don’t like it,” says Ben Collier, a security researcher and senior lecturer at the University of Edinburgh. As part of a recent study into how low-level cybercriminals are using AI, Collier and fellow researchers spotted an increasing pushback over the use of generative AI in underground cybercrime forums and hacking groups. During the generative AI boom and hype cycles of the past couple of years, some people posting on hacking forums have moved from being positive about how AI can help hacking to a greater skepticism about the technology, according to the study, which also involved researchers from the University of Cambridge and the University of Strathclyde. The researchers analyzed 97,895 AI-related conversations on cybercrime forums since the launch of ChatGPT in 2022 until the end of last year. They found complaints about people dumping “bullet-pointed explainers” of basic cybersecurity concepts, moaning about the number of low quality posts, and concerns about Google’s AI search overviews driving down the number of visitors to the forums. For decades cybercrime message boards and marketplaces, often Russian in origin, have allowed scammers to do business together. They are places where stolen data can be traded, hacking jobs are advertised, and fraudsters shitpost about their rivals. While scammers often try to scam each other , the forums also have a sense of community. For example, users build up reputations for being reliable, and forum owners hold writing competitions . “These are essentially social spaces. They really hate other people using [AI] on the forums,” Collier says. He says the social dynamic of the groups can be messed up by potential cybercriminals trying to gain a better reputation by posting AI-generated hacking explainers. “I think a lot of them are a bit ambivalent about AI because it undermines their claim to be a skilled person.” Posts reviewed by WIRED on Hack Forums, a self-styled space for those interested in talking about hacking and sharing techniques, show an irritation caused by people creating posts with AI. “I see a lot of members using AI for making their threads/posts and it pisses me off since they don’t even take the time to write a simple sentence or two,” one poster wrote. Another put it more bluntly: “Stop posting AI shit.” In several instances, Collier says, users of multiple forums appear to be irritated by AI posts as they want to make friends. “If I wanted to talk to an AI chatbot, there are many websites for me to do so … I come here for human interaction,” one post cited in the research says. Since ChatGPT emerged toward the end of 2022, there has been significant interest in AI-hacking capabilities and how the technology can transform online crime. Both sophisticated hackers and those less capable have been trying to use AI in their attacks. While some organized fraudsters have boosted their operations with ever-more realistic AI face-swapping technology and social engineering messages translated using AI , a lot of attention has been on generative AI’s capabilities to write malicious code and discover vulnerabilities . “More sophisticated threat actors are aware of the shortfalls of commercial models that have guardrails, and they know ways to jailbreak those prompts,” says Ian Gray, vice president of intelligence at the security company Flashpoint, referring to the safety mechanisms put in place by OpenAI , Anthropic , and Google . “They’re also cautious of AI-generated projects in forums or marketplaces—there are weaknesses and vulnerabilities, sometimes exposing the underlying infrastructure,” Gray says. Flashpoint has seen hackers recently talking about the potential capabilities of Claude Mythos Preview , Anthropic’s latest frontier AI model, which has thrown some in the cybersecurity industry into a panic . Some cybercriminals have also disparaged others for allegedly using AI in their hacking operations—“all they can do is use AI,” one group said, according to Flashpoint’s analysis. Collier says that so far, among the lower-level cybercriminals that his study tracked—not sophisticated or nation-state-backed hackers—there hasn’t been any obvious signs of “real disruption” caused by AI. “It has not significantly reduced the skill barrier to entry, nor has it led to serious disruptions to established business models or practices,” the study says. “Instead, its main impact has been on already highly automated areas such as SEO fraud, social media bots, and some forms of romance scam.” Despite the frosty reception of AI being used on cybercrime forums, others see potential. Some posters on Hack Forums have said they would perhaps welcome an AI assistant that would “help” them structure their posts and improve grammar, but they draw the line at an AI that can fully post for them. “An AI generator for posts would turn this into a clanker forum of AI's talking to each other,” one person wrote. Meanwhile, Flashpoint researchers have spotted hackers discussing the idea of building an “AI-enhanced” cybercrime market, which was touted as a way to help people to buy stolen data and online accounts more quickly. Not everyone was on board. As one person wrote, “IT’S A STUPID FUCKING IDEA TO PUT AI INTO YOUR MARKET.” Comments Back to top You Might Also Like In your inbox: Upgrade your life with WIRED-tested gear Palantir employees wonder if they’re the bad guys Big Story: They built a legendary privacy tool —now they’re sworn enemies These AI models tried to scam me—some of them were scary good Event: How to adapt, compete, and win in the next era of business Matt Burgess is a senior writer at WIRED focused on information security, privacy, and data regulation in Europe. He graduated from the University of Sheffield with a degree in journalism and now lives in London. Send tips to [email protected] . ... Read More Senior writer Topics artificial intelligence hacking cybersecurity security Crime scams Read More AI Tools Are Helping Mediocre North Korean Hackers Steal Millions One group of hackers used AI for everything from vibe coding their malware to creating fake company websites—and stole as much as $12 million in three months. Matt Burgess 5 AI Models Tried to Scam Me. Some of Them Were Scary Good The cyber capabilities of AI models have experts rattled. AI’s social skills may be just as dangerous. Will Knight X’s Big Bot Purge Wiped Out a Lot of People’s Secret Porn Feeds The platform’s large-scale crackdown on automated accounts is also impacting people who’ve spent years curating niche porn on secret X accounts. Jason Parham AI Slop Is Making the Internet Fake-Happy A new study examines the impact of the rise of AI-generated websites on the internet—and found some surprising results. Kate Knibbs The Pope’s Warnings About AI Were AI-Generated, a Detection Tool Claims Pangram Labs’ updated Chrome extension puts warning labels on AI slop as you scroll your social feeds. Miles Klee OpenAI Really Wants Codex to Shut Up About Goblins “Never talk about goblins, gremlins, raccoons, trolls, ogres, pigeons, or other animals or creatures unless it is absolutely and unambiguously relevant,” reads OpenAI’s coding agent instructions. Will Knight 90,000 Screenshots of One Celebrity's Phone Were Exposed Online Spyware appears to have captured everything from intimate photos to private messages from the smartphone of European celebrity. They were publicly accessible until a researcher flagged the exposure. Matt Burgess Men Are Buying Hacking Tools to Use Against Their Wives and Friends In Telegram groups, men are sharing thousands of nonconsensual images of women and girls, buying spyware, and engaging in doxing and sexual abuse. Matt Burgess The US Army Is Building Its Own Chatbot for Combat The AI system, trained on real military data, is meant to give soldiers mission-critical information. Will Knight These AI Thirst Trap Creators Say They’re Misunderstood A viral red carpet moment shone light on a group of hunky Instagram influencers—and the followers who are too horny to care that they’re not real. Ej Dickson A Dark-Money Campaign Is Paying Influencers to Frame Chinese AI as a Threat Build American AI, a nonprofit linked to a super PAC bankrolled by executives at OpenAI and Andreessen Horowitz, is funding a campaign to spread pro-AI messaging and stoke fears about China. Taylor Lorenz Tech CEOs Think AI Will Let Them Be Everywhere at Once Mark Zuckerberg and Jack Dorsey have different visions for how to use AI for management purposes, but both imagine a system of heightened control. Miles Klee