Astana Media Week: the opportunities and risks of AI for journalism
The 10th Astana Media Week was held on 14–16 October. It discussed the impact of artificial intelligence on journalism; Kazakhstan called for labelling AI-generated content and adopting common standards.
The 10th Astana Media Week was held on 14–16 October in Astana, the capital of Kazakhstan. The main theme of the three-day forum was the opportunities and risks of artificial intelligence (AI) for journalism.
Who took part
The forum brought together representatives of Kazakhstan, Georgia, Azerbaijan, Kyrgyzstan, Switzerland and other countries, as well as experts from Euronews, Meta, TikTok and UNICEF. Its slogan was “MEDIA. HUMAN. AI: 10 Years of Transformation.”
Opportunities and risks
The discussions cited AI's opportunities as speeding up content production, generating illustrations and cutting costs. The risks included false information (hallucinations), increasingly convincing deepfakes, the algorithm-driven “filter bubble,” job losses and the question of accountability. According to figures cited at the forum, Google referral traffic to more than 2,500 news sites fell about 33% between November 2024 and November 2025.
Kazakhstan's proposal
Kanat Iskakov, First Vice Minister of Culture and Information of Kazakhstan, called for labelling AI-generated content and for adopting common AI standards in newsrooms. He stressed that responsibility always rests with people — the journalist and the newsroom.
