Researchers at Originality.ai analyzed 558 books in the herbal medicine category on Amazon published between January and September 2025 and concluded that 82% of them could have been written by artificial intelligence. The Guardian reports this.
The study authors noted an increase in the volume of unverified and untagged AI content about herbs, raising concerns about the reliability and safety of information that could impact public health.
One such book is the bestselling Handbook of Natural Healing, authored by Luna Philby, a herbalist said to be from Australia. However, efforts to find evidence of Philby's existence or her My Harmony Herb brand on the Internet were unsuccessful. Originality.ai has marked the available text samples as 100% AI-generated.
At least 29 books apparently created by artificial intelligence also mention the work of controversial herbalists Barbara O'Neill and Alfredo Bowman, who promoted untested cancer treatments.
Last year, mushroom hunters were warned not to buy mushroom books on Amazon that appeared to be written by chatbots and contained questionable advice on how to distinguish poisonous from edible mushrooms.
Publishers Association CEO Dan Conway said his organization is calling on Amazon to start labeling AI-generated content. “Any book written entirely using artificial intelligence must be labeled appropriately, and trash books created by artificial intelligence must be removed immediately,” he said.
In response, Amazon emphasized that it uses a variety of tools to monitor content standards and remove books that violate its rules. However, critics say current measures are not enough to prevent the spread of unchecked AI content.
