Stories featuring dubious experts
US PR services giant Cision is now investigating the press releases it hosts for the site MyJobQuote which feature a network of home and garden experts with crude AI pictures who do not seem to exist.
In the wake of Press Gazette’s revelation of more than 600 published pieces featuring advice from apparently non-existent experts , publishers such as the BBC , Reach and News Corp have begun removing the stories from their sites with many now giving ‘404’ errors.
Update (11/12/25): Cision has removed dozens of MyJobQuote press releases from its platform which were also appearing on Google News (a platform which is supposed to be reserved for bona fide publishers).
A week after Press Gazette first questioned whether any of MyJobQuote’s network of 15 widely-quoted experts actually exist none of them have come forward or complained, suggesting our concerns were well founded.
Despite repeated attempts to contact MyJobQuote, which is a major UK online marketing platform for tradespeople and the construction industry, the company has remained silent.
Cision’s UK office (which has an answering machine message which cheerily concludes, “See you in 2021!”) did not initially respond to questions about the press releases hosted on their site.
In the wake of the Press Gazette’s piece on MyJobQuote ( and a call out on Linkedin ), the American press office got in touch to say they were now investigating MyJobQuote.
A spokesman for the global PR services company said: “Cision takes allegations of misleading or fabricated information seriously. While our role is to provide a distribution platform for organisations to share their news, all customers are required to comply with our Terms of Service, which prohibit the submission of false or intentionally misleading content.
“We share your commitment to ensuring that the information that reaches the public is accurate and reliable.
At time of going to press, the press releases from MyJobQuote remained live on the Cision press release platform – although the formerly prolific publisher has stopped sharing more advice from its ever-helpful network of experts, and the last one was published on 3 December.
The press releases featured more than a dozen ‘experts’ in everything from interior design to gardening who proved extremely elusive online, with no LinkedIn profiles, social media – or, crucially, a way to book their services.
One ‘expert’, Fiona Jenkins, whose image was 99% probably AI-generated according to AI detector Pangram, has been featured more than 170 times in the British media.
Cision said: “We are currently reviewing the activity associated with the customer you referenced, including their recent press releases and compliance with our policies. Where we identify violations, we take appropriate action, which may include removal of content or restrictions on account activity.
“While we cannot discuss the specifics of individual customer accounts, we can confirm that this review is underway and that we will act accordingly if any breach of our terms is found.”
Press Gazette has shared a spreadsheet of more than 500 articles featuring MyJobQuote’s apparently imaginary experts in mainly IPSO-regulated publications .
Reach is the only publisher to respond publicly to this story. Chief content officer David Higgerson said: “The industry will need to work together to develop new ways to manage these growing threats.”
But there has been widespread debate about this issue in the PR industry and there is some evidence journalists are already taking extra steps to verify sources.
PR consultant Jack Jolly told Press Gazette that the piece was: “Already having an impact. The team and I have had a few emails already asking for a Linkedin profile on experts this morning.”
One journalist asked Jolly via email: “Do you have a pic of your client and some information about his education and his LinkedIn?’
Another asked: “Do you have a LinkedIn link for your client at all I can include? I’m struggling to find him online.”
Alex Cassidy of NeoMam Studios, whose research helped identify the fake case studies from MyJobQuote said: “The cross-channel response from both press and PR has been a hugely positive sign. Editors, writers, digital marketers, SEOs and PRs have all collectively criticised the approach that leads to untraceable experts in national news. After all, it’s in everybody’s interest that we have a verifiable, robust media ecosystem, and that examples like MyJobQuote don’t become the norm.
“Sadly, we know the development of AI will continue to be unregulated, and that there will always be bad actors trying to game systems. This is why it’s crucial that we re-examine the processes on both sides of the aisle, PR and press, to ensure that human-led expertise is always at the forefront of our industry’s future.”
Mabo PR consultant Samantha Hall said: “I was originally suspicious when I was manually looking for pieces of coverage for my client, back in August/September time. I noticed that a lot of articles that either included my clients or didn’t, also included commentary from experts that appeared to have AI generated headshots.
“In fact to me, the headshots looked a lot like ‘people’ that were generated through sites such as This Person Does Not Exist . The ‘people’ generated by these sites have a very specific look to them- they’re usually positioned in the same ways, are not particularly HD, yet could still look real to someone that isn’t aware that these sites even exist.
“In one article that my client was lucky enough to be included in, I noticed that the other two ‘experts’ included in it both had headshots that looked like they were from a site like this. One of these ‘experts’ was in fact from MyJobQuote. One of the worst things about this, is that this particular expert has an expert bio in hundreds of articles that claims that he’s a “Gas Safe engineer!”.
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