AI term of the day: hallucination A hallucination is when an AI model gives you an answer that sounds confident and correct but is made up. A fake statistic. A court case that never happened. A book by an author who never wrote it. A Nigerian regulation that doesn't exist. Why it happens: A language model predicts the most likely next words. It doesn't look facts up unless it's connected to a tool or a document that lets it. When it doesn't know, it often produces something that sounds right instead of saying "I don't know". Why it's dangerous: The wrong answer looks exactly like a right one. Same tone, same confidence, sometimes with fake sources attached. How to protect yourself: Ask it to show its sources, then open them. Give it the document and ask it to answer only from that (this is what RAG does). Double-check numbers, names, dates and laws before you use them. Be most careful in areas you don't know well, because that's where you won't notice. AI is a fast first draft, not a final authority.