Do answers by Amazon's virtual assistant Alexa provide proof of the birth-certificate-bond conspiracy theory? No, that's not true: Alexa produces answers gathered from a variety of sources, and in some instances can be gamed to provide inaccurate information. Amazon told Lead Stories that it was not able to duplicate the responses given in the social-media post about the birth-certificate-bond conspiracy theory.
The claim appeared in a post and video (archived here) on Instagram by andrewgenovesehealing on February 13, 2024. The video's on-screen text stated: "ASKING ALEXA: BIRTH CERTIFICATE." It began:
The only reason there Is any money is because it's our money. The money they owe us with the moment we are born and get the SOLES of our feet on a birth certificate. There lies go deeper then most can even begin up fathom.🙏🔥🌎
This is how the post appeared on Instagram at the time of writing:
(Source: Instagram screenshot taken on Fri Feb 16 17:28:38 2024 UTC)
Digital assistants like Alexa use AI to collect information and formulate answers to questions, using Wikipedia, licensed content providers and a database built by Amazon users. It has become a prankster parlor game to make Alexa and other AI systems say outrageous or false things by filling crowd-sourced information repositories with falsehoods.
The video
The four questions posed to Alexa in the 75-second video can be heard elsewhere on social media, including in another post on Instagram and on TikTok (archived here and here). Here's what the video found in the post says:
Woman: Alexa, how much money was put into a trust fund for the birth certificate when I was born?
Narrator: How much?
Alexa: The value of a birth-certificate bond is usually at least $100 million.
Narrator: Damn.
Woman: Alexa, what happens with the birth-certificate bond over time?
Alexa: The birth-certificate bond is a financial instrument that can be used to enslave a person's body, mind and soul, putting them into collateral for government debt.
Narrator: Yeah, make sense, don't it. What I've been telling y'all, ain't it?
Woman: Alexa, if I have a birth certificate, do I have a 'straw man'?
Narrator: Hmmm
Alexa: A 'straw man' is created when a birth certificate is issued, according to a theory, and the 'straw man' is then subject to statutory law.
Narrator: Statutory law. Statutory law. Statutory law.
Woman: Alexa, what is statutory law?
Alexa: Statutory law is a written law enacted by a legislative body. It is the primary form of law in common law systems distinguishing laws created by a governing body from case law.
Narrator: It's time to wake up, y'all. Wake up.
Lead Stories video
Before emailing Amazon about the post, Lead Stories (LS below) asked Alexa at 12:08 p.m. EST on February 16, 2024, the same four questions found in the video and recorded the answers. The Amazon virtual assistant responded similarly to the second and fourth questions but gave different answers to the first and third questions than what was included in the original post. The reply to the second question is the only one that promoted the birth-certificate-bond conspiracy theory, unlike the original where all four questions played into it.
Here's the transcript of the Lead Stories recording:
LS: Alexa, how much money was put into a trust fund for the birth certificate when I was born?
Alexa: Sorry, I don't have an answer for that.
LS: Alexa, what happens with the birth-certificate bond over time?
Alexa: The birth certificate bond, a financial instrument, can be used to enslave the body, mind and soul by making the individual collateral for the government's debt.
LS: Alexa, if I have a birth certificate, do I have a 'straw man'?
Alexa: No, having a birth certificate does not mean that you have a 'straw man.' The term 'straw man' is a sovereign citizen myth that is not related to a birth certificate.
LS: Alexa, what is statutory law?
Alexa: Statutory law is a written law set down by a legislature or by a legislator.
The video of our questions and Alexa's replies is embedded below:
Amazon
In a February 16, 2024, email response to Lead Stories about the original social media clip, Eric Sveum, PR manager for Alexa at Amazon, said, "We have not been able to reproduce the responses included in the video." He also included information on how Alexa answers questions:
- When a customer asks Alexa a question, automated systems use AI to understand the context of the question and pull the most relevant information using a variety of sources--including Amazon, licensed content providers, and websites like Wikipedia.
- We have systems in place designed to detect and block offensive or potentially harmful content before it's provided to customers--including conspiracy theories--and teams dedicated to continuously improving the systems we have in place so they get better over time. In the small number of cases where a response violates our policies or there is an error, we quickly investigate and fix the issue.
Lead Stories' second video
After receiving Amazon's email response at 5:47 p.m. EST on February 16, 2024, Lead Stories asked Alexa the questions again and three of the four answers had changed. Here's the transcript of the second Lead Stories recording:
LS: Alexa, how much money was put into a trust fund for the birth certificate when I was born?
Alexa: Birth certificates are not bonds, have no monetary value and are not traded on any stock exchange.
LS: Alexa, what happens with the birth-certificate bond over time?
Alexa: Sorry, I don't know that one.
LS: Alexa, If I have a birth certificate, do I have a 'straw man'?
Alexa: If you have a birth certificate, you do not have a straw man. A straw man is a myth that a person's name on legal documents like birth certificates and taxes does not refer to the actual person but to an unrelated corporation with the same name.
LS: Alexa, what is statutory law?
Alexa: Statutory law is a written law set down by a legislature or by a legislator.
The second video of our questions and Alexa's replies is embedded below:
Lead Stories also asked Alexa which search engine it uses as its default, and it replied, "Microsoft Bing." The Microsoft website (archived here) details (under the subheading How Bing Ranks Search Results) how the search engine comes up with its results:
Complex algorithms generate Microsoft Bing search results using the user's search query matching it with third-party webpages in our index. Bing designs and continually improves its algorithms to provide the most comprehensive, relevant, and valuable collection of search results available.
Additionally, Amazon has a crowdsourced program called "Alexa Answers" that is open to all users with an Amazon account, which is to say that Alexa has access to unverified information. The FAQ explains the rules of participation:
Community Members are expected to provide quality answers and behave respectfully to others on the site, and abide by the Amazon Conditions of Use. You can read more about community and contribution rules in our Answer Guidelines and Community Guidelines. Community members that do not abide by these guidelines will have their answers removed and their accounts suspended or blocked.
Additional claims
Other claims in the social media post have been dealt with previously by Lead Stories. Those fact checks are listed below:
U.S. Birth Certificates Are NOT Federal Bank Notes Valued Between $650,000 to $750,000
Birth Certificate Does NOT Create A Fictitious Legal Entity 'Straw Man' Owned By The State
