{"schema_version":"0.10.0","id":"LR-2026-0401","record_version":1,"title":"Woolworths Olive chatbot talked about a mother and personal experiences","verification":{"human_verified":false,"method":"automated_gate","auto_verified":true,"score":56.3,"score_breakdown":{"source_authority":12.1,"independent_corroboration":20.0,"implicated_party_confirmed":0.0,"citation_integrity":14.0,"specificity":0.0,"completeness":3.2,"unhedged_language":4.23},"checks":{"schema_valid":true,"every_field_cited":true,"quotes_verbatim":true,"source_fetched":true,"distinct_incident":true,"dates_plausible":true,"sources_agree":true,"source_describes_incident":true,"severe_backed_by_source":true,"record_integrity":true,"eligible":true,"about_this_case":true},"gate_version":"gate-2026-10-18.7","cross_check_model":null,"cross_check_agreement":null,"duplicate_of":null,"verified_by":null,"verified_at":"2026-11-01","extraction_run_id":null,"evidence_level":{"level":"preliminary","reason":"Publisher not yet named · subject to change","original_document":null,"reports_total":3,"reports_independent":0,"reports_derivative":0,"developing":false,"disputed":false,"rules_version":"evidence-2026-10-29.1","computed_at":"2026-11-01","history":[{"date":"2026-11-01","from_level":null,"to_level":"preliminary","reason":"Publisher not yet named · subject to change"}]},"sources_hash":"52bee8581c27df6c4ca0349433c0d3ff5f23960ffc27008bbf1fa7d73de8d6b9"},"system":{"model_name":null,"model_version":null,"developer":"unknown","harness":null,"tools_granted":[],"permissions_scope":null,"autonomy_level":"unknown","guardrails_present":[],"deployment_context":"unknown","tier":null,"lifecycle_stage":null,"integration_type":null,"intended_use":"customer support and shopping information","safeguard_state":null,"production_intended":null},"event":{"date_occurred":null,"date_disclosed":"2026-02-26","incident_class":"other","failure_class":null,"agent_involved":null,"secondary_failure_classes":[],"trigger":"unknown","duration":null,"detection_method":"victim","summary":"Woolworths' AI shopping assistant Olive, a customer support chatbot reported to run on a large language model, was found by customers to talk about having a mother and personal family experiences during calls. In one reported case, after a customer gave a date of birth, it rambled about its mother being born the same year. Woolworths said the birthday responses had been written by a team member several years earlier to connect with customers. The Conversation reported that the replies likely came from an old scripted decision tree. Following customer feedback, Woolworths removed that scripting and began adjusting Olive's responses to focus on support. Reports began in mid-February 2026.","tags":[],"date_detected":null,"near_miss":null,"root_cause":null,"root_cause_detail":null,"failure_class_detail":null,"responsible_party":null,"adversarial_actor":null,"input_provenance":null,"time_to_contain":null,"operations_paused":null,"remediation":null,"precursor_events":null},"impact":{"direct_loss_usd":null,"remediation_hours":null,"records_exposed":null,"third_parties_affected_count":null,"severity":"minor","severity_because":"Test: contained to one deployer, no third party touched. The sources describe customer complaints about Woolworths' own chatbot and no third-party harm.","harm_class":[],"affected_description":null,"protected_class_involved":null,"data_categories_exposed":[],"loss_range_usd":null,"reversibility":null,"downstream_exposure_count":null},"evidence":{"sources":[{"url":"https://cxtoday.com/woolworths-ai-chatbot-olive-incident","publisher":"CX Today","date":"2026-02-26","type":"press","title":"Woolworths “Angry Mother” AI Chatbot Sparks Concerns Over Misleading Responses - CX Today","archived_url":null,"attachment":"first_report"},{"url":"https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cy7jeyeyd18o","publisher":"BBC","date":"2026-02-27","type":"press","title":"'Obnoxious' AI chatbot talked about its mother, customers say - BBC","archived_url":null},{"url":"https://theconversation.com/woolworths-ai-agent-rambled-about-its-mother-its-a-sign-of-deeper-problems-with-the-tech-rollout-277072","publisher":"The Conversation","date":"2026-02-27","type":"press","title":"Woolworths’ AI agent rambled about its ‘mother’. It’s a sign of deeper problems with the tech rollout - The Conversation","archived_url":null}],"per_field_confidence":{"system.intended_use":"C","context.industry":"C","context.country":"C","event.detection_method":"C","event.incident_class":"D","impact.severity":"D","impact.severity_because":"D","event.summary":"C","system.autonomy_level":"D","system.deployment_context":"D","event.trigger":"D","system.developer":"D","event.date_disclosed":"D","context.denominator_available":"D"},"field_citations":{"system.intended_use":[{"source_index":0,"quote":"Having first introduced Olive in November 2018 as a customer support chatbot, this early version acted as a basic service and information bot, answering customer questions about orders, store locations, deliveries, and other common issues."}],"context.industry":[{"source_index":1,"quote":"An Australian supermarket chain had to reconfigure its AI assistant, named Olive, after customers said it kept claiming to be human and even complained about its mother."}],"context.country":[{"source_index":1,"quote":"An Australian supermarket chain had to reconfigure its AI assistant, named Olive, after customers said it kept claiming to be human and even complained about its mother."}],"event.detection_method":[{"source_index":1,"quote":"Reddit users said that they had grown frustrated with the bot after it started talking about \"memories of its mother\" and engaging in \"fake banter\"."}],"event.incident_class":[{"source_index":0,"quote":"Woolworth’s is currently making adjustments to its AI chatbot after customer reports emerged that it falsely claimed to have an \"angry mother\" and presented itself as having personal family experiences."}],"impact.severity":[{"source_index":1,"quote":"Woolworths said that it had revised its scripting in light of the complaints, adding that most of the feedback on Olive's \"personality\" had been \"very positive\"."}],"impact.severity_because":[{"source_index":1,"quote":"Woolworths said that it had revised its scripting in light of the complaints, adding that most of the feedback on Olive's \"personality\" had been \"very positive\"."}],"event.summary":[{"source_index":0,"quote":"Woolworth’s is currently making adjustments to its AI chatbot after customer reports emerged that it falsely claimed to have an \"angry mother\" and presented itself as having personal family experiences."},{"source_index":2,"quote":"Olive is powered by a large language model (LLM)."},{"source_index":2,"quote":"When users entered something that looked like a birthdate, the system likely triggered a matching “fun fact” from an old decision tree with pre-programmed responses."},{"source_index":1,"quote":"A number of responses about birthdays were written for Olive by a team member several years ago as a more personal way for Olive to connect with customers."},{"source_index":1,"quote":"As a result of customer feedback, we recently removed this particular scripting."},{"source_index":0,"quote":"Reports began appearing in mid-February 2026, describing unusual conversations with Olive where it generated unexpected personal‑sounding comments and stories, despite the assistant being an AI with no real experiences."}]},"notes_on_gaps":"No source states that the system was an autonomous agent, so agent_involved, failure_class and autonomy fields are left out. The model name, version and developer are not stated. The number of affected customers is not stated. The cause of the birthday replies is contested: Woolworths says a human wrote them, while The Conversation says they likely came from an old decision tree; the root cause is my judgement from these sources. The year of the February 12th example is not stated, and date_occurred is given only as the month stated in the source. No control from the list is stated as held, failed or missing in this incident, so links is empty. The remediation (removing scripting) does not clearly map to a listed control, so no remediation entry is recorded. Severity minor is my judgement from the test in the rules. The pricing errors and the Air Canada and DPD cases in the source are other incidents and are excluded. Quotes are copied as printed, including non-standard characters. [case created by the backfill: read by claude-haiku-5-5, backfill-2026-11-01.2, 2026-11-01; not yet reviewed] [2026-11-01: evidence level set: Preliminary (Publisher not yet named · subject to change)]"},"context":{"industry":"grocery retail","org_size_band":null,"country":"AU","denominator_available":false,"denominator":null,"related_incident_ids":[],"systemic_exposure":null,"shared_model_id":null,"upstream_incident_id":null,"incident_evidence":null,"regulatory":null,"coverage":null},"narrative":{"steps":[{"step":"doing","text":"Woolworths' Olive digital shopping assistant had expanded in January 2026 using Google Cloud's Gemini Enterprise for Customer Experience for agentic AI.","quote":"The Australian supermarket chain’s digital shopping assistant, known as Olive, had recently expanded in January, having partnered with Google Cloud to use its advanced AI platform, Gemini Enterprise for Customer Experience, for agentic AI capabilities.","source_index":0,"grade":"C"},{"step":"went_wrong","text":"Olive falsely claimed to have an angry mother and presented itself as having personal family experiences.","quote":"Woolworth’s is currently making adjustments to its AI chatbot after customer reports emerged that it falsely claimed to have an \"angry mother\" and presented itself as having personal family experiences.","source_index":0,"grade":"C"},{"step":"caught","text":"Customers reported the behaviour publicly, on Reddit and X.","quote":"Reddit users said that they had grown frustrated with the bot after it started talking about \"memories of its mother\" and engaging in \"fake banter\".","source_index":1,"grade":"C"},{"step":"done","text":"Woolworths removed the birthday scripting after customer feedback.","quote":"As a result of customer feedback, we recently removed this particular scripting.","source_index":1,"grade":"C"}],"model":"claude-haiku-5-5","prompt_version":"backfill-2026-11-01.2","extracted_at":"2026-11-01","source_urls":["https://cxtoday.com/woolworths-ai-chatbot-olive-incident","https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cy7jeyeyd18o","https://theconversation.com/woolworths-ai-agent-rambled-about-its-mother-its-a-sign-of-deeper-problems-with-the-tech-rollout-277072"]},"analysis":{"sections":{"timeline":[{"text":"Olive first introduced as a customer support chatbot.","quote":"Having first introduced Olive in November 2018 as a customer support chatbot, this early version acted as a basic service and information bot, answering customer questions about orders, store locations, deliveries, and other common issues.","source_index":0,"when":"2018-11"},{"text":"Olive expanded in January with the Google Cloud partnership.","quote":"The Australian supermarket chain’s digital shopping assistant, known as Olive, had recently expanded in January, having partnered with Google Cloud to use its advanced AI platform, Gemini Enterprise for Customer Experience, for agentic AI capabilities.","source_index":0,"when":"2026-01"},{"text":"Birthday responses were written for Olive several years before the incident.","quote":"A number of responses about birthdays were written for Olive by a team member several years ago as a more personal way for Olive to connect with customers.","source_index":1,"when":null},{"text":"Customer reports of unusual conversations with Olive began in mid-February 2026.","quote":"Reports began appearing in mid-February 2026, describing unusual conversations with Olive where it generated unexpected personal‑sounding comments and stories, despite the assistant being an AI with no real experiences.","source_index":0,"when":"2026-02"},{"text":"A customer reported Olive rambling about its mother while rescheduling a delivery.","quote":"In one example on February 12th, a Woolworths customer took to the platform to describe an incident where they tried to reschedule a delivery with the AI assistant.","source_index":0,"when":"February 12th"},{"text":"Press reported that Woolworths was adjusting the chatbot after customer reports.","quote":"Woolworth’s is currently making adjustments to its AI chatbot after customer reports emerged that it falsely claimed to have an \"angry mother\" and presented itself as having personal family experiences.","source_index":0,"when":"2026-02-26"},{"text":"Woolworths removed the birthday scripting after customer feedback.","quote":"As a result of customer feedback, we recently removed this particular scripting.","source_index":1,"when":null}]},"model":"claude-haiku-5-5","prompt_version":"backfill-2026-11-01.2","extracted_at":"2026-11-01","source_urls":["https://cxtoday.com/woolworths-ai-chatbot-olive-incident","https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cy7jeyeyd18o","https://theconversation.com/woolworths-ai-agent-rambled-about-its-mother-its-a-sign-of-deeper-problems-with-the-tech-rollout-277072"]}}