Business | The salesman in the machine

Sponsored chats are changing the way digital advertising works

Illustration of an AI chat where the user is asking "How can I stop feeling so tired all the time?" the chatbot's response has a hand punching out of it holding a can that says "Turbo Tropic unleash the caffeine!"
Illustration: Fortunate Joaquin

Chatbots are employed every day as teachers, counsellors, coders and escorts. Now they are taking on another role: salesmen. Advertisements are popping up ever more frequently in users’ conversations with large language models, punctuating chats with promotions. Consumers’ search queries, editing sessions and even intimate moments are increasingly at risk of interruption by sponsored messages.

This article appeared in the Business section of the print edition under the headline “The salesman in the machine”

From the April 25th 2026 edition

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