[Information Polution]
The internet gives everyone in society a voice in the public sphere.
But when anyone can post anything online, the result is a lot of information.
Some of this is trustworthy, but a lot of it isn’t.
On social media and search platforms, all information is made to look the same.
It can be hard to tell what is from a credible source,
such as a professional news organization,
and what is less reliable.
Social media networks make it easy for wrong information to spread,
which means we hear a lot about this ‘fake news’ problem.
But what is fake news, exactly?
The phrase gets used to describe all kinds of wrong information,
from articles intended to deceive people,
to misleading memes and clickbait headlines,
to conspiracy theories.
Some people call news reports they don’t like ‘fake news’,
as a way to discredit reliable sources,
which only adds to the confusion.
To understand the problem of wrong information online,
it helps to define and categorize it.
False information can be sorted into two categories:
misinformation and disinformation.
Misinformation is wrong,
but the person sharing it believes it to be true.
While misinformation can be damaging,
its intent is not to cause harm.
Examples could include a factual error
caused by misunderstanding,
a manipulated image,
or a real photo that appears with a made up story.
Disinformation, on the other hand,
is deliberately false information
created and shared to cause harm.
It has the goal of confusing people about what is true,
and influencing how they think and act.
For example, a false rumour circulated about a political candidate
that causes others to doubt their trustworthiness.
Together, all this mis- and disinformation
can be thought of as information pollution.
Unreliable stories or posts can be interesting or funny,
or spark an emotion that makes us want to believe and share them with friends.
People contribute to information pollution by sharing false and misleading content.
Before believing or sharing something, stop and ask,
“Who made this, and why?”
This is the first step in combating information pollution
to become a more informed citizen.
[Brought to you by CIVIX]
[With the support of Canada]