Google, Facebook, TikTok and Twitter have all agreed to a voluntary code of conduct targeting misinformation. But the only real commitment is to appear as though they’re taking action.
Banning extremists from social media platforms can reduce hate speech, but the deplatforming process has to be handled with care – and it can have unintended consequences.
Millions of supporters of Donald Trump flocked to the far-right social media platform, where hate speech and calls for violence thrive. The US Capitol insurrection could be the platform’s undoing.
Calling out false information on social media may do more harm than good.
U.S. President Donald Trump speaks with reporters after participating in a video teleconference call with members of the military on Nov. 26, 2020, at the White House in Washington. He reiterated his baseless claims during the news conference that the Nov. 3 election was ‘rigged.’
(AP Photo/Patrick Semansky)
If citizens disbelieve the institutions that count ballots and the organizations that accurately report on those results, it will be impossible to agree on what a legitimate election looks like.
Parler is similar to Twitter but doesn’t control or discourage hate speech or calls to violence.
OLIVIER DOULIERY/AFP via Getty Image
Millions of supporters of Donald Trump have flocked to the far-right social media platform Parler, where hate speech thrives.
Mail-in and absentee ballots, like these being processed by election workers in Pennsylvania, are a subject of misinformation spreading across social media.
AP Photo/Matt Slocum
Election misinformation typically involves false narratives of fraud that include out-of-context or otherwise misleading images and faulty statistics as purported evidence.
T.J. Thomson, Queensland University of Technology; Daniel Angus, Queensland University of Technology e Paula Dootson, Queensland University of Technology
In an age of democracy via social media, platforms are struggling to combat visual mis/disinformation such as ‘spliced’ images and deepfakes. Digital media literacy has never been so important.