The websites—including northeasttimes.com, lowerbuckstimes.com, southphillyreview.com, and centraljersey.com—are owned by Paradise Media, a digital marketing company based in Puerto Rico and Malta, according to Brandon Chamberlain, general manager of Donnelly Media, which sold the domains and their content to Paradise Media around 2023 and 2024.

Former reporters whose names appear on the sites say they are frustrated and concerned about the misuse of their professional identities.

Steven Bassin, who worked as a sports reporter for centraljersey.com until early 2022, said he recently discovered a story about Lionel Messi published under his byline. "I haven't worked there for three years," Bassin said. "I now see a story done on Lionel Messi with my name on it, and clear as day, I don't work there anymore. I, clear as day, didn't write this story, so I don't know why I'm being used there."

Bassin also noticed that his author photo and that of former colleague Mark Rosman had been replaced with images of different people. "It's kind of ridiculous that they have Mark and me as totally different people and that we're still on their page as well," he said.

At least three journalists on centraljersey.com had stories under their author pages that they did not write and photos that were not of them, including WHYY's Ken Downey Jr.

"That's not me," Downey said upon seeing his author page. "That is my name associated with my former publication. That is a bio that looks pretty accurate about myself, but that is not my picture. These two top articles; those are not my work. They are dated as recent as of this year. I haven't been associated with the company in almost a full seven years."

Andrew Martins, a four-time New Jersey Press Association Award winner who last wrote for the Central Jersey papers in 2018, found a recent story under his byline about a stock market plunge. "As someone who's currently in the job market and in this line of work, my byline is incredibly important, and to see my byline not just be used in a new way, but also to not have my actual photo there, it's just extremely disconcerting," he said.

Martins also noted that his award-winning articles are no longer available on the site. "Most of my work is gone, and if it's supposed to be a record of what happened in these communities, it's doing an extreme disservice to those communities," he said.

The investigation began in July when WHYY's Meir Rinde noticed that northeasttimes.com had published an article strikingly similar to one he had written for Billy Penn's city guide series about Bustleton and Somerton. The Northeast Times version used the same quotes without attribution.

The reporter credited on that story, Ellen Kowalczyk, had a bio describing her as a longtime resident of the Far Northeast but offered no details about her education or prior work. She had no online presence beyond the newspaper's website. When her photo was analyzed with an AI-detection tool, it was found to be 99.9% likely to be AI-generated.

Other reporters on the Northeast Times site—including Maya Brooks, Ray Doyle, and Pat Nowak—had similarly vague bios and photos that appeared potentially AI-generated. After the outlet was contacted for comment, the author pages disappeared within 24 hours.

As of Nov. 9, the Northeast Times website claimed it did not use AI in its reporting, stating that a "human answers for every piece" and that it used "no fake photos." But the investigation found at least 10 stories on the site that copied sources and quotes from Billy Penn, WHYY, The Philadelphia Inquirer, Philly Mag, The Philadelphia Citizen, 6abc, and other local outlets.

One article about a free arts program closely mimicked reporting from The Philadelphia Citizen. Another about a deli closure used unattributed quotes from an Inquirer article and included a photo of a sandwich that appeared AI-generated. Even an article about tools to prevent unwanted AI was seemingly reworded and republished from WHYY.

Many main images on stories appeared to be AI-generated, including images of the Philadelphia skyline and City Hall that were unattributed and looked manipulated. Photos taken by Billy Penn reporters were used on Northeast Times stories without authorization.

The same patterns appeared on other Paradise Media-owned sites. Lower Bucks Times had an author named Tyler Dunphey whose photo showed a coffee shop that does not appear to exist online, with inconsistent logos on the window and sign. South Philly Review used images that appeared AI-generated. Star News Philly published a story about a massive snowstorm in Philadelphia despite no such storm being in any forecast. New reporters seemed to be generating over 10 stories in one day.

Donnelly Media, which owns the print editions of the Northeast Times, Lower Bucks Times, South Philly Review, and several New Jersey papers, sold the website domains and existing content to Paradise Media as part of a rebranding effort to boost digital revenue.

"It was understood that the writers still currently employed by us, their content would live on there, not be changed," Chamberlain said. "It would be sort of an archive site. We wouldn't have any ownership of it, but their content would stay up there, which is perfectly fine. And then we would begin posting our content under a newly branded site."

Donnelly Media's actual online sites are now patimes.media and centraljersey.media. But as of Nov. 9, some Paradise Media-owned sites still listed Donnelly Media as their owner and referred readers to their print versions. There were no disclosures on sites owned by either company explaining the difference in affiliation.

Chamberlain said Donnelly Media has been addressing issues case by case when reporters complain. "We've been able to deal with everything on a case-by-case basis," he said. "So when a call comes in, we deal with it swiftly. We explain what exactly the issue is, and we reach out to the contact at Paradise, and … generally, they take the story down."

He suspects AI is involved, citing incorrect information in stories and suspicious photos. "I don't know where their employees are, or even if there are employees," he said.

Chamberlain said he was not worried about the problem continuing. "The problems are fewer and fewer and fewer," he said. "We haven't lost any sales." But he acknowledged the companies could do a better job distinguishing themselves. "We may push a little harder for the separation," he said.

Bassin said he has tried to reach former colleagues at Donnelly Media but has not heard back. Since speaking with reporters, more articles have appeared under his byline—over 30 published between Nov. 3 and Nov. 9 that he said he did not write, many on betting sites far from his area of coverage.

"When you click on centraljersey.com all my stories are front and center that I've not written," he said. "It's bad. I'm very frustrated, very upset. I'm very worried that something could affect me from this."

He added: "I'll be honest with you, it makes me feel taken advantage of even more. This should have been taken care of a long time ago. The fact of the matter is, they sold the site. People are still getting affected by it that used to work for them or still work for them. So I don't know why they haven't done a good enough job to shut this down if they know about it."

Alex Mahadevan, a faculty member specializing in AI and AI policy at the Poynter Institute, said ethical AI use in newsrooms must align with journalism's values of transparency, accountability, and doing no harm. But AI-generated text is where the line gets murky.

"That's sort of where we've drawn the line is AI writing, and so I think that's sort of the next big ethical question that is out there," Mahadevan said.

He said the problem is widespread. "It's everywhere," he said. "It is literally in every community in the entire country; there are AI-generated newspapers that are popping up."

Mahadevan said AI models are good at modeling language but not at writing. "It's what a paragraph looks like, but it's not how a paragraph is actually written," he said. "You cannot just automate a news site. You can't do it. You cannot do it. And so when people try to do it, it just ends up plagiarizing a real news site to try to look like a news site."

He questioned whether such sites could be profitable. "These are not good news sites. They're terrible. So I can't, for the life of me, figure out how they're trying to make money off of a defective product, but that's what they're putting out there," he said. His hunch is that companies are using AI-generated articles to sell advertising or collect data.

On the legal front, Mahadevan said copyright issues could allow someone whose story was stolen to send a takedown request, but newsrooms usually lack the resources to sue, and the First Amendment sets a high bar for proving such cases in court.

He said he is hopeful that as people encounter discrepancies and issues from AI-generated news sites, they will turn to legitimate sources. "I think we are in this transition period where people are maybe not paying as much attention to what they consume online, but once it starts affecting their lives, then they're going to realize the value of local news," he said.

The Northeast Times' AI policy changed on Tuesday morning to say that reporting from its "AI-assisted team" may not be 100% accurate, and bylines were replaced with "AI News Team." By Tuesday afternoon, that language was removed and bylines were changed to "NewsDesk."

Martins said he is disappointed in the direction local news is heading. "Companies need to realize that more goes into crafting a piece of news," he said. "It's not just letters and punctuation and turns of phrase, but it's the people that do the work. It takes time. It takes effort. It takes skill, and it's very hard to live in a world in this profession where people think that content has no purpose."

He added: "Local news is supposed to be the history book of communities. To see this done this way, it's extremely galling. What I wish was that there would be more that people would remember that the content that we write or did write in these papers is important, regardless of whether it was written in 2011 or 2026. This needs to be a record of what happened and what went down to keep not just that information alive, but to remind people of what mattered to these communities."

Paradise Media did not respond to requests for comment. After reporters reached out on Nov. 9, the company changed the content of some of its websites, but many stories without attributed photographers or authors remained online.