{
  "id": 2552449,
  "title": "Devious New Font Turns AI Scrapers Into Mincemeat",
  "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/08/22/devious-new-font-turns-ai-scrapers-into-mincemeat",
  "topic": "ai",
  "section": "AI",
  "published": "2026-08-22T10:01:00.000Z",
  "source": {
    "name": "Futurism",
    "slug": "futurism",
    "url": "https://futurism.com/artificial-intelligence/devious-new-font-turns-ai-scrapers-into-mincemeat"
  },
  "original_language": "en",
  "account": "A group of designers are taking aim at AI scrapers with a new font called \"ShieldFont.\" This font appears as normal text to human eyes, but when AI scrapers scan webpage HTML, they receive scrambled, unintelligible data. This protects publishers' work by making scraping costly and difficult. ShieldFont alters words and phrases, turning them into nonsensical combinations while maintaining readability for humans. However, OCR cannot decipher the altered text, which could cause problems for disabled users and translation tools. The designers emphasize the goal is to frustrate large-scale automated scraping to respect creators' rights and promote ethical AI practices.",
  "summary": "The font makes \"the text itself polluted, harder, and more expensive to collect without permission.\" The post Devious New Font Turns AI Scrapers Into Mincemeat appeared first on Futurism .",
  "key_points": [
    "ShieldFont protects publishers' work by scrambling AI scraper data",
    "Altered text is unreadable to OCR, causing issues for disabled users",
    "Designers aim to frustrate large-scale automated scraping ethically"
  ],
  "editors_take": null,
  "illustration": null,
  "coverage": {
    "outlets": 1,
    "also_reported_by": []
  },
  "ai_generated": true,
  "disclaimer": "Summaries, key points and the editor’s take are written by software from other outlets’ reporting and may contain errors — always check the linked original."
}