Information Quality Among Us

Source: made on Canva

My thoughts on information quality have changed during the past few sessions and I have learnt a great deal about fake-news. Whether we are digital natives or visitors, it is crucial for us to be aware of our own filter bubbles. The existence of bots on Social Media could potentially have an impact on influencing public’s perception at a global level.

I agree with Alicia’s post about the creation of fake-news which “ boils down to one’s character to create/distribute wrong information.” An example she mentioned was the Las Vegas Shooting where information was rapidly being shared on Social Media, regardless of it’s factual or satirical nature.

Source: made on Canva, content by (French, 2016)

Although third-party fact-checkers, like Snopes, are available, more can be done towards the removal of fake-news by implementing stricter rules within Networking sites, but could this impact their profitability? Networking sites gain from fake-news as it increases the company’s revenue from page views and advertising.

I can relate towards Nicholas’s post that “it is crucial that we widen our networks and research widely” so that we aren’t stagnant in our own echo chamber. It was also insightful to read about the credibility of influencer’s post on Social Media as digitally-doctored photos can be manipulative and even pose as “evidence” supporting fake-news.

Source: made on Canva, content by (Wan, 2017)

The fake-news ecosystem is growing more political and vastly influential, it was seen that Donald Trump’s campaign manager tweeted links to fake-news, which appeared in the news on Google (Dewey, 2016). Fake-news may have affected the 2016 US Presidential election and this only emphasizes the importance of fact-checking sources.

Source: Paul Horner, owner of the fake-news empire and responsible for the satire news about the 2016 presidential election

As mentioned in Jian Wen’s post, Singapore is also susceptible to fake-news such as the IKEA scam that was circulated around the Internet and instant messaging apps. The intention of this scam is to steal the user’s personal information that could make them vulnerable to identity thief (Surane, 2017).

In conclusion, we can’t identify a malicious bot at first glance as bots are getting more sophisticated and significantly harder to spot (bots hacking into real accounts, humans lending bots their account, etc.) (Brandom, 2017). We can however, start by spreading the awareness of bots, fact-checking the source and being unbiased toward a post through critically analyzing a post, might prevent an unbiased outcome.

Source: original content

(Word count: 317)

Comments:
Alicia’s Blog
Nicholas’s Blog

References:
French, 2016. This person makes $10,000 a month writing fake news (online). Retrieved from: https://www.marketwatch.com/story/this-person-makes-10000-a-month-writing-fake-news-2016-11-17

Wan, 2017. Many people can’t tell when photos are fake. Can you? (online). Retrieved from: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/speaking-of-science/wp/2017/07/17/many-people-cant-tell-when-photos-are-fake-can-you/?tid=ss_tw&utm_term=.2dc9fcf2a72c

Dewey, 2016. Facebook fake-news writer: ‘I think Donald Trump is in the White House because of me’ (online). Retrieved from: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-intersect/wp/2016/11/17/facebook-fake-news-writer-i-think-donald-trump-is-in-the-white-house-because-of-me/?tid=a_inl&utm_term=.dfae318eb4f7

Surane, 2017. Scammers Are Constructing Fake People to Get Real Credit Cards (online). Retrieved from: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-09-12/scammers-are-constructing-fake-people-to-get-real-credit-cards

Brandom, 2017. How to Spot a Twitter bot (online). Retrieved from: https://www.theverge.com/2017/8/13/16125852/identify-twitter-bot-botometer-spambot-program

Consumer’s rights: The Transparency of Information

Source: Drew Graham

The “Filter Bubble”, a friend or foe?

Tailoring search results and news towards who you are and what you do as an individual can be marked as one of the biggest technological breakthroughs in this digital age. In a recent survey, 57% are OK with providing personal information if it’s for their benefit, while 74% get frustrated when content & ads appear to have nothing to do with their interests (Consumer Perceptions of Social Login Study, 2013).

Source: Original content

Consumers want a system of searching and finding information with minimal effort. However, is the sense of civic responsibility lost due to the lack of transparency with such an algorithm?

Source: Laura Aziz

Users don’t know what gets through these personalised filters. It’s essential to have control over their own filter bubble, as algorithms aren’t programmed with ethics (J. Delaney, 2017). People should seek out factual news that challenges their beliefs and adds different perspectives to subjects no matter how uncomfortable and conflicting it may be.

A functioning democracy only works with a good flow of objective information, yet Social Media increases polarising segregation that only benefits the user’s ideology. This can become disastrous when consumers receive fake news that manipulates their opinion.

A research project done over nine countries, including America, found that misinformation of propaganda is widespread online and is “supported by Facebook or Twitter’s algorithms”. The results confirm that bots reached positions of measurable influence during the 2016 US election (Woolley & Guilbeault, 2017). Source of side banner: original content

I feel that automated bots create an illusion of online support & popularity that allows political candidates to be eligible where they might not have been before. In addition to fake news emerging as a propaganda tool, bots can also influence political processes of global significance.

Networking sites need implement algorithms that can identify and remove automated bots. Individuals need to be aware of the rising risk of computational propaganda. We need to break out of our filter bubbles, source out factual information and identify censorship and propaganda.

A video explaining the manipulation of social media & disinformation that have led to a decline in Internet freedom.

(Word Count: 304)

References:
Consumer Perceptions of Social Login Study, 2013. Online Consumers Fed Up with Irrelevant Content on Favorite Websites, According to Janrain Study (online). Retrieved from: http://www.janrain.com/about/newsroom/press-releases/online-consumers-fed-up-with-irrelevant-content-on-favorite-websites-according-to-janrain-study/

Woolley & Guilbeault, 2017. Computational Propaganda in the United States of America: Manufacturing Consensus (online). Retrieved from: http://comprop.oii.ox.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/sites/89/2017/06/Comprop-USA.pdf

How to evaluate website content, 2017. The University of Edinburgh, Using the Internet for Research (online). Retrieved from: https://www.ed.ac.uk/information-services/library-museum-gallery/finding-resources/library-databases/databases-overview/evaluating-websites

J. Delaney, 2017. Filter bubbles are a serious problem with news, says Bill Gates (online). Retrieved from: https://qz.com/913114/bill-gates-says-filter-bubbles-are-a-serious-problem-with-news/