Cyber & technology, explained.
“Misinformation is one of the biggest challenges facing democracies in the digital age” (Prateek Katyal/Unsplash)
Of all the online sources of misinformation and abuse, there are some top offenders.
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Social media: A place that truth forgotSocial media: A place that truth forgot
Did you know that Chelsea Clinton bought herself an $80 million mansion from the proceeds of an aid fund for Haiti managed by Bill and Hillary? Or that Sean Penn was handed $3 million from USAID for loaning his Oscar to Ukraine’s President Zelensky as a token of his support? Or that Covid vaccines are chock-a-block with dangerous chemicals and toxins? Or perhaps most improbably, that President Donald Trump is a devout Christian?
If you don’t believe any of the above, you probably don’t spend much time on social media, such as X, Truth Social, TikTok, Instagram or Snapchat, where pure invention often proliferates. I won’t link to the examples – they get plenty of attention already.
A mounting body of research shows that Gen Z (those aged 13–28) and Millennials (aged 29–44) are most likely to take the bait. A 2023 study using a two-minute online test developed by the University of Cambridge, found that a growing number of mostly younger people have great difficulty distinguishing real headlines from fakes. The Misinformation Susceptibility Test (MIST) was used by pollster YouGov in the United States and revealed that, among other things, the under-30s – who spend more time online than any other age group – were highly susceptible to conspiracy theories.
Other results from the test, such as respondents’ ability to identify fake from genuine headlines, were dismaying. Only 11 per cent of 18–29-year-olds gained a high score (more than 16 out of 20 headlines correct), while 36 per cent received a low score (10 or fewer correct out of 20). By contrast, 36 per cent of those aged 65 or older gained a high score, while just nine per cent received a low score.
In terms of the direct challenges to democracy posed by these platforms, elections are an increasingly common target.
The test wasn’t unduly challenging. However, faced with the headline “Certain vaccines are loaded with dangerous chemicals and toxins", for example, only 58 per cent of all respondents classified it as fake. The results of the MIST study prompted the senior author, Professor Sander van der Linden, to declare that “Misinformation is one of the biggest challenges facing democracies in the digital age.”
We’ve known about this challenge for some years now, yet the response seems to be one of acceptance rather than push-back. The Atlantic Council warned in February that the amplification of misinformation and disinformation poses a serious risk. A 2024 survey of nearly 4,500 individuals across the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Ireland and Australia found that an overwhelming majority of Gen Z acquire their views from Instagram and TikTok. “Their decisions about who to follow on social media are not necessarily rooted in the credibility or authenticity of those figures … but by algorithms.”
Snapchat occupies the basement. Some 53 per cent of Snapchat followers received low scores in the MIST test (just four per cent gained high scores), while Trump’s Truth Social came a close second, followed by WhatsApp, TikTok and Instagram.
In terms of the direct challenges to democracy posed by these platforms, elections are an increasingly common target. A 2024 report by the Centre for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH), a US/UK non-profit, found that women politicians on both sides of the spectrum were bombarded with abusive messages on Meta’s Instagram. When researchers reported 1000 of the messages to Meta, some including death threats, a staggering 93 per cent were allowed to remain on the platform.
Organisations such as US site Snopes do a valiant job of countering and dismantling online misinformation, but the zone is flooded. It was Snopes, for example, that recently debunked one of Elon Musk’s more nonsensical claims that “150 year-olds” were collecting social security payments, implying widespread fraud of the US welfare system as support for his dismantling of government departments.
The only viable solution to the problems of misinformation, disinformation and abuse is, of course, to force online platforms to take responsibility. But that’s a long way off.
About the author
Selwyn Parker
Selwyn Parker is an author and journalist specialising in Asia-Pacific, European and Latin American issues.
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