I would assume someone speculated and then the hype brain took over and everyone reported it as AI.

I've had that happen to the company I work at and we literally have zero AI stuff.

Hype Brain :) And the language changed just a little bit..

From my understanding that was to be used as a last resort.

there was this German talking head "Nico Lange" who made this claim first without providing evidence for it. He is an ex politician and a regular in the Munich Security Conference and I assume this is who was (mainly) responsible for spreading it.

AI gets so much boost from this nonsense. Because now it's about saving our lives.