Traditional news publishers remain the most trusted news sources among Australians, with 79% finding national news publishers at least moderately trustworthy, compared with just 38% for AI-generated news, according to Deloitte’s Media & Entertainment Consumer Insights 2026 report.
The 15th edition of the report surveyed a nationally representative sample of more than 2,000 Australians aged 16 to 91, with fieldwork conducted between July and August 2026. It examines changing attitudes towards AI-generated content, media consumption, advertising influence and entertainment spending.
Deloitte Australia Telecommunications, Media and Technology Lead Partner, Peter Corbett, said traditional publishers have a clear trust premium over AI-generated news, even as Australians bring AI into their everyday lives.
“Australians are more willing to trust AI content when a human has reviewed and edited it, and they want to know when AI has been used. Using these tools does not mean accepting their output without question,” he said.
Calls for greater transparency
The report found 75% of respondents believed AI-generated content made it harder to determine what was real online. 84% believed platforms and publishers should be legally required to label AI-generated content, while 71% said they would stop using a platform that failed to clearly disclose its use.
Concerns also extended to harm, with 53% extremely concerned about harmful deepfake content affecting children and young people, and 49% expressing the same level of concern about misinformation.
Generational divide
Gen Z were significantly more open to AI-generated news, with 49% rating it at least moderately trustworthy, compared with 21% of Boomers.
However, trust in national Australian news publishers was almost identical across generations, at 79% for Gen Z and 80% for Boomers. Independent or regional news publishers were also highly trusted overall, at 78%.Younger Australians were also more confident in spotting AI content, with 72% of Gen Z believing they could detect AI-generated or significantly altered content, compared with 31% of Boomers.
“There is a stark generational divide in how Australians judge AI-generated content,” Corbett said.
“Gen Z are more confident they can identify it and more willing to trust AI-generated news, while Boomers are more sceptical and less certain they can tell what is real. Yet both generations place similarly high trust in national news publishers, underlining traditional news’s trust premium and the importance of clear disclosure as AI becomes part of everyday life.”
AI reshaping search
The report also found 48% of Australians regularly used standalone AI tools in their personal lives, with ChatGPT the most preferred tool across the activities examined.
Among regular users, 40% preferred a single model across all activities, while younger users were more likely to use multiple models.
Meanwhile, 57% said AI-generated search summaries made searching easier and encouraged them to conduct more searches. However, around one in ten reported no longer clicking through to original sources after viewing an AI-generated search summary.
