Last updated: August 16, 2026
This Artificial Intelligence and Automation Policy explains how Ridgecrest Online at https://ridgecrestonline.com, part of the Times Media Service network, may use artificial intelligence and automated systems while preserving human editorial responsibility.
Purpose and scope
This policy covers generative artificial intelligence, machine-assisted editing, transcription, translation, synthetic media, data and code assistance, content-management automation, and other automated tools used in editorial work.
For this policy, AI-assisted work is created and controlled by a person using a tool for defined tasks. AI-generated material is text, imagery, audio, video, analysis, or another output substantially produced by a system. Automation means software performs a repeatable editorial, production, or distribution task with limited manual intervention.
Human editorial accountability
A responsible human remains accountable for the editorial standards and corrections applied to every item we publish. Material AI-generated or AI-assisted editorial content must receive human review before publication. Artificial intelligence does not independently decide that original reporting is ready for publication, and an AI system does not receive a human byline.
Use of an automated tool does not lower our standards for accuracy, sourcing, attribution, fairness, originality, privacy, or correction. AI output is not treated as verified evidence or an authoritative source merely because it is fluent or confident.
Permitted assistance
Subject to appropriate human review, AI and automation may assist with tasks such as:
- Brainstorming, outlining, and developing questions for further reporting.
- Grammar, readability, formatting, and headline alternatives.
- Transcription, translation, summarization, and document organization.
- Discovering potentially relevant sources that a journalist then evaluates directly.
- Data cleaning, calculations, coding, and visualization support.
- Drafting metadata, tags, accessibility text, or distribution copy.
- Monitoring public information or organizing material for editorial review.
- Drafting assistance when the responsible contributor verifies the facts and substantially controls the final work.
These uses are optional. Their inclusion in this policy does not mean every Times Media Service publication or contributor uses each capability.
Required human controls
Before publishing material AI-generated or AI-assisted editorial content, the responsible contributor or editor must apply controls appropriate to the work, including:
- Verifying factual assertions against credible underlying sources.
- Comparing quotations with recordings, transcripts, notes, or documents.
- Opening and evaluating cited links rather than relying on generated citations.
- Checking names, dates, locations, statistics, and other specific details.
- Validating calculations, code, datasets, and data-derived conclusions.
- Reviewing translations for meaning, context, and culturally significant language.
- Applying added scrutiny to health, finance, elections, public safety, crime, legal matters, and serious allegations.
If the necessary verification cannot be completed, the material should not be presented as established fact.
Prohibited uses
We do not knowingly use artificial intelligence or automation to:
- Fabricate sources, quotations, evidence, events, credentials, or eyewitness accounts.
- Create a false author identity or impersonate a real person.
- Present synthetic or materially altered media as documentary evidence of an event that did not occur as depicted.
- Publish unverified allegations or factual claims.
- Conceal plagiarism, copy another publisher’s work without added value, or evade attribution.
- Generate large volumes of repetitive or low-value pages primarily to manipulate search visibility or advertising revenue.
- Upload confidential source identities, unpublished investigations, credentials, or protected personal information to an unapproved tool.
- Misrepresent wire, partner, press-release, or automated material as original reporting.
Disclosure of material AI use
We provide an article-level disclosure when artificial intelligence played a material role that a reasonable reader would want to know when assessing the work. Disclosure is normally appropriate when AI:
- Generated or substantially rewrote publishable text.
- Produced analysis, conclusions, calculations, or a visualization on which the article materially relies.
- Generated or materially altered a realistic image, audio recording, or video.
- Created a translation, simulation, or reconstruction whose method affects interpretation.
- Performed another substantial function that could affect a reader’s understanding of authorship, evidence, or reliability.
A useful disclosure should describe what the system did and the human review applied. Routine spelling, formatting, transcription, or internal research assistance may not require article-level disclosure when it does not materially shape the published work.
Synthetic and altered media
Synthetic or materially altered media should be labeled at or near the point where readers encounter it. Captions should state when material is illustrative, generated, reconstructed, or materially altered if omission could mislead a reasonable reader.
We do not use photorealistic synthetic media in a manner likely to deceive readers about an actual news event. Ordinary cropping, color correction, resizing, and layout work are not treated as synthetic alteration unless they materially change the meaning of an image.
Sources, attribution, and copyright
AI-assisted work must still credit the reporting, documents, data, images, and ideas on which it relies. A generated summary does not replace review of the original source.
We do not assume that AI output is original, licensed, accurate, or safe to publish. Contributors should review output for unattributed copying and rights concerns and verify the provenance and permitted use of visual or audio material.
Privacy, security, and confidential material
Contributors should minimize personal, confidential, embargoed, and unpublished information entered into AI systems. Confidential source identities, private credentials, unpublished investigations, and sensitive personal records must not be placed into an unapproved tool.
An editor should be consulted before AI is used with material whose disclosure could harm a source, violate a duty of confidence, compromise an investigation, or create a significant privacy or security risk.
Automation and scaled publishing
Automation may support ingestion, tagging, formatting, monitoring, distribution, and other repeatable tasks. Material obtained or transformed through automation should not be represented as original reporting without appropriate provenance and editorial review.
We do not use automation to mass-publish near-duplicate pages that offer little original value to readers. Wire, partner, public-record, press-release, and other externally supplied material should be identified where its provenance matters.
Human editors retain control over material corrections, retractions, and withdrawals.
Freelancers, contributors, and partners
Freelancers and commissioned contributors should disclose material AI use to their assigning editor before publication. Partner-supplied material should identify its source and is subject to the labeling and review appropriate to the arrangement.
AI-related errors
Errors in AI-assisted or automated material are handled under our Corrections, Updates and Retractions Policy. When relevant to reader understanding, a correction note may explain that an automated process contributed to the error.
Material undisclosed use, fabricated content, or failure to apply required verification may lead to editorial review and corrective action.
Contact and policy review
Questions or concerns about our use of artificial intelligence and automation may be sent to newsmaster@timesmediaservice.com with the relevant article URL and details.
Times Media Service may review and update this policy as technology and newsroom practices change. The date shown above identifies the latest published version.