A recent message from a new acquaintance caught me off guard: “You have your own biography???” it asked. “How come you never mentioned this?”
Curious, I headed over to Amazon to find out more. To my surprise, I discovered a biography titled “The Biography of Kashmir Hill,” released in August 2025, nearly a year prior. The book featured a mottled brown cover, and the publishing house was unfamiliar to me. Initially, there were no reviews, so I took the liberty of leaving one, inquiring whether I might have a chance to speak with the author. The hardcover edition was priced at $26.99, which felt a bit excessive, but after my editor decided to indulge and purchase a copy, I felt compelled to read it.
The biography spans 90 pages but honestly could be shorter. It mixes readily available details about my life, such as my hometown, with broad insights that could apply to anyone, presented like a lengthy horoscope. The author noted, “You cannot understand Kashmir Hill without understanding her contradictions,” and included an exhaustive account of my intricate coffee-making routine—although, as a fact-check, I must say my husband usually handles that.
Flattering, fictionalized, and filled to the brim with em dashes, this work bore the unmistakable traits of poorly crafted A.I. writing. I took a look at the author, John Crane Miller, whose bio described him as an experienced biographer and cultural analyst. His profile picture was a widely circulated stock photo of a white male in a suit speaking at a conference. “The Biography of Kashmir Hill: The New York Times Technology Journalist Who Exposed Clearview AI, Challenged Big Tech and Redefined Privacy in the Digital Age” was just one of ten biographies he published in a single week, all focused on journalists, including my colleague Mike Isaac, Jeffrey Goldberg from The Atlantic, and Jake Tapper of CNN.
