Isn't the technology that enabled the deception noteworthy? Presumably this person wouldn't have been able to do this before AI.

Hypothetically, if a hacking tool was released that let non-technical people hack into sensitive databases, and then a journalist wrote the headline "local man hacks IRS", without any mention of the tool, wouldn't that be a bit irresponsible, to purposely leave that information out?

The technology used is very much relevant, because the ease of access and easiness of production are likely to have been the biggest contributors. Had they had to open an image editor and spend a few hours to make something convincing, they would’ve been much less likely to do so, assuming this particular person even had the skills, and would have had multiple opportunities to change their mind.

It’s a crime of opportunity¹, one where you have the idea and act on it on a whim. No opportunity, no crime, and the technology provided the opportunity.

So yes, the technology used matters.

¹ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crime_of_opportunity

The one time the headline isn't misleading, you want it changed?

Yes, it's an interesting and novel thing about a topic many people here are interested in.

I so wish this were true. Put AI in the title, garner instant attention.

That would be so vague as to be useless.

Except the actual title here is clearer. Your suggestion is so anti-AI-clickbait that it overflew and became a bad title again.

If Tesla (insert any car manufacturer you hate) ran over a kid I'd like to see the title say it, instead of "Tesla fined for violating traffic laws."

Yes, and at the same time we should ask the question: would the intersection between "people who think this is a funny thing to do" and "people with the technical capabilities to actually generate something that misleads police" [1] return a value > 0 before GenAI?

[1] waiting for some example where fool policemen where outsmarted with simple tricks /s