University of Zurich researchers secretly unleashed an army of manipulative chatbots on the r/changemyview subreddit — and they were more persuasive than humans at getting people to change their minds.

The platform’s chief legal officer called out the University of Zurich team that deployed bots on r/changemyview to study how AI can influence opinions.

Reddit responded on April 28 to news that a group of researchers had conducted a secret experiment using artificial intelligence chatbots in one of its most popular forums. The actions of those involved in the experiment have raised questions about whether deception is ever justified when conducting research on human subjects.