So, I stumbled upon something pretty wild while browsing Facebook – a bunch of fake accounts posing as NFL fan pages. These aren't your average, run-of-the-mill fan pages, though. They're slinging misinformation left and right, and what's even weirder is that they're using what seems to be AI-generated images to do it.

I mean, who even comes up with this stuff? One Steelers fan account, for example, claimed that Adam Thielen retired to join the Pittsburgh Police Department. Seriously? And they even had an AI-generated image of him in a police uniform to "prove" it. Thielen did retire and had a brief stint with the Steelers, but last I checked, he wasn't planning on fighting crime.

It gets even crazier. Another account, this one for Broncos fans, spread a rumor that Broncos reporter Cody Roark had died after a domestic violence incident. They even used an AI-generated image of him holding a child. Roark is very much alive, and doesn't have kids. "Usually you see that happen to, like, high-profile celebrities," Roark said.

It's easy to dismiss this as just some random internet weirdness, but it points to a bigger problem. Someone is clearly putting effort into creating these fake accounts and generating these false stories. So, what are they hoping to achieve? Well, it seems like the end game is ad revenue. Each post links to websites with clickbait articles. Harvard researchers pointed out that these pages try to get viewers to click on links that takes them away from Facebook, probably to make money with ads.

It's all about the clicks. These fake fan accounts link to websites pretending to be real news sources, like "ESPNS" or "NCC News." But once you click on those links, you're bombarded with ads. It's basically a digital bait-and-switch.

However, there may be an additional step. Georgetown researcher Josh Goldstein told NPR that some accounts could be trying to get more followers with fake news to then sell products, link to websites loaded with ads or even change the accounts to talk about politics.

It makes you wonder what other kinds of misinformation are lurking on social media. And, more importantly, how we can stop it from spreading. So, next time you see a wild claim on Facebook, take a second to check it out before you believe it. You might just save yourself from being fooled by some AI-powered shenanigans.