Last month, my colleagues and I published our findings on America First Refining, a Texas oil refining startup that secretly received funding from Donald Trump Jr. We discovered stories about the Trump administration’s tariff policies, sanctions on Russian oil, and the private zoo of an Indian billionaire family.
At the center of the story was Texas businessman John Carruth, CEO of a refinery company. We spent weeks researching Carce, pulling out old lawsuits, property records, and corporate registry filings to piece together a portrait of what appears to be an unknown serial entrepreneur who had spent years trying and failing to raise money for a hopeless refinery project.
And shortly before our article was published, we decided to look into another company he had incorporated called Brownsville Energy Storage Terminals.
When I saw the company’s website, I had a moment of panic. Did I somehow miss the existence of a large corporation owned by the central character of the next story?
“From Houston to Rotterdam, Jurong to Fujairah, our network connects the world’s most important energy markets with speed, security and precision bulk oil storage,” the company announced on its website’s homepage.
Screenshot by ProPublica
According to its website, Brownsville Energy Storage Terminal had more than 850 employees and 28 million barrels of oil storage capacity at six hubs around the world. This was puzzling. Our reporting suggested that Calce did not oversee a large multinational oil storage company and was having trouble raising enough money for a single project in the United States.
Were we wrong?
We reached out to Google to learn more about the company’s leadership team. CEO Sarah Jenkins has more than 20 years of experience with major energy companies. And David Chen, the company’s chief technology officer, “built the company’s proprietary inventory management portal and integrated AI-driven predictive maintenance system,” according to his bio. But I couldn’t find any trace of either online. Chalk it up to a common name?
I then Googled one of the more distinctive names: Dr. Sofia Rossi, Vice President of Sustainability. He was the person who “prepared assets for biofuels and hydrogen and spearheaded the ‘Fuels of the Future’ program.” But again, nothing. The link to their LinkedIn profile was broken.
Screenshot by ProPublica
A search for the company’s Texas phone number found the same number listed online for a baklava caterer in Houston, a taxi service in the Dallas area, and an obstetrician’s office.
We called the Texas number and it said “Dead.” We then tested the numbers from the company’s facilities in the Netherlands, Singapore, and China. Also dead.
We were beginning to suspect that this company didn’t actually exist, at least as stated on the website.
What was going on with this website? When I looked at the source code, I noticed a strange notation: “This feature has not been implemented yet, but don’t worry, you can request it at the following prompt!”
Screenshot by ProPublica
I checked the site’s domain registration and got the (obvious) answer. It was created this year and dates back to a company called Hostinger, which offers an AI website builder for $2.99 per month. The group’s website states, “If you write it, AI will build it for you.” “It will automatically appear in Google and AI searches.”
In fact, Google’s “AI Overview” search response increasingly regularly appeared to users by default, seemingly endorsing the company’s legitimacy.
Screenshot by ProPublica
When I searched for the awards the company claims to have won on its website, the Google AI Overview states, “Recent notable winners include Brownsville Energy Storage Terminal, recognized for rapid expansion in the independent oil and terminal operations sector.”
Screenshot by ProPublica
Brownsville Energy Storage Terminals is a true LLC. But everything on the website appears to be fictitious, from the company’s history to its job postings to its diversity and inclusion policies. But perhaps more troubling is that Google, owner of the world’s leading investigative tools, has deployed an AI synopsis that can indiscriminately take in fake material and regurgitate it authoritatively as real.
“AI Overview is rooted in our core search ranking system and provides reliable, high-quality information for the vast majority of queries,” a Google spokesperson said in a statement in response to questions.
After we contacted Hostinger, they shut down the site. “In response to inquiries, we conducted an internal investigation. Based on the violations identified, we suspended the website and the accounts underlying it in accordance with our Terms of Service,” the spokesperson said in a statement.
What we have encountered is a particular seed of a larger problem that is beginning to be better understood. In April, The New York Times reported that an analysis found that Google’s AI summaries were accurate nine times out of 10, noting that given the sheer volume of searches, it adds up to “tens of millions of incorrect answers per hour.” (A Google spokesperson told the Times there were “significant holes” in the study; the company acknowledged that the AI summary “could make mistakes.”)
A BBC reporter wrote a hypothetical article in which he claimed to be the best technology journalist at eating hot dogs. Google’s AI and ChatGPT quickly picked it up and parroted it back.
Also, the source material for AI Overview appears to be very gameable, even if it doesn’t trade on actual fiction. “Using Reddit to Manipulate AI Search Is Very Easy, Study Suggests” was a recent article headlined by 404 Media.
In the end, the mysterious website was just one part of our story. But the larger implications are clear. Counterfeits, imitations, and scams that would have taken a great deal of effort to create just a few years ago can now be churned out almost instantly.
While preparing this article, we reached out to Calce to ask him about the site. Attorneys for his company, America First Refining, responded to us in a letter dated June 24 that the attorney sent to Hostinger. The attorney also addressed letters to several email addresses listed on the Brownsville Energy Storage Terminal website.
“I am writing to request that you immediately remove from the brownsvilleenergyterminals.com website all unauthorized references to America First’s office address on your website,” the letter reads. “As you know, America First has no connection or affiliation with the Brownsvilleenergyterminals.com website and does not authorize the use of corporate addresses there.”
I’ve always wondered what this website was for. Was this simply published by a malicious attacker who found the company’s LLC records and decided to create a website? Was it a test site placed online by mistake? Or is it something designed for consumption by someone who thinks it’s real?
We don’t know, but we sent an email to the press contacts listed on the website. [email protected]bounced back.
