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Disinformation — Ppublic perceptions and practical responses
The document discusses the challenges of countering online disinformation and the public's perceptions of news credibility in a digital media ecosystem. It highlights issues such as low brand recognition, trust deficiencies in news sources, and the blurred lines between real and fake news, especially among younger audiences. The text emphasizes the need for improved media literacy and the support of independent journalism as critical measures to enhance societal resilience against misinformation.
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Disinformation — Ppublic perceptions and practical responses
- 1. Rasmus Kleis Nielsen Director,Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism Countering Online Disinformation: Towards a more transparent, trustworthy and accountable digital media ecosystem European Commission, January 29, 2019 DISINFORMATION — Public perceptions and practical responses @rasmus_kleis @risj_oxford
- 2. 2 Q10a_new2017_rc. Which ofthese was the MAIN way in which you came across news in the last week? Base: All/under 35s that used a gateway to news in the last week: All markets = 69246/19755. See Newman et al (2018) 2018 Reuters Institute Digital News Report. The rise of distributed discovery All markets
- 3. Far from creatingfilter bubbles, distributed discovery often exposes people to more sources 3 Automated serendipity means that people who use search and social media (and news aggregators) tend to use more sources of news and greater diversity of sources than those that don’t The effect of incidental exposure to news on social media is particularly clear for the young and those least interested in news See e.g. Fletcher and Nielsen (2018) “Are people incidentally exposed to news on social media? A comparative analysis,” New Media & Society 20 (7): 2450-2468
- 4. 4 “IT’S THEIR JOB… TO REPORT THE FACTS” Q2. You recently viewed a story with the headline X. On which of the following news websites did you read this story? If you read it on more than one, please select all that apply. Showing share of correct brand attributions. Base: Direct 1,098/ Search 1,022/ Social 1,008 (Facebook 795, Twitter 194) 2X difference But brand attribution is a problem … Fewer than half can remember the news brand that produced a story when coming from social media or search See e.g. Kalogeropoulos et al (2018) “News brand attribution in distributed environments: Do people know where they get their news?,” New Media & Society
- 5. 5 ALL 37 MARKETS- % THAT TRUST EACH MOST OF THE TIME Uncertainty in distributed environments, information unchecked, hard to distinguish news from rumor... Mostly this about trust in mainstream media and in the sources that people use Trust news I use 44% Trust news overall 51% Trust news in search 34% Trust news in social 23% See Newman et al (2018) 2018 Reuters Institute Digital News Report. … as is trust
- 6. 85% 71% 69% 66%66% 66% 65% 64% 63% 63% 62% 61% 60% 60% 60% 60% 58% 57% 55% 53% 51% 50% 50% 49% 49% 48% 47% 46% 44% 43% 42% 41% 38% 37% 36% 36% 30% 54% 0% 20% 40% 60% 80% 6 Q_FAKE_NEWS_1. Please indicate your level of agreement with the following statement. “Thinking about online news, I am concerned about what is real and what is fake on the internet.” Base: Total sample in each market Brazil Issue in the elections Spain Catalan independence a flashpoint Germany Low level concern post election USA Popularised by Trump and the media itself See Newman et al (2018) 2018 Reuters Institute Digital News Report. Varied concern over whether online news is real or fake
- 7. See Nielsen andGraves (2017) “’News you don’t believe’: Audience Perspectives on Fake News”. Audience perspectives on “fake news”
- 8. 8 What type of‘f*ke news’ do people say they are EXPOSED to? ALL MARKETS see poor journalism, mistakes and clickbait every week 42% complain about spin and agenda- filled news 39% say they have been exposed to completely made up news 26% Only See Newman et al (2018) 2018 Reuters Institute Digital News Report. Audience definitions of problem are much wider
- 9. 9 See Newman etal (2018) 2018 Reuters Institute Digital News Report. Concern versus exposure to types of misinformation etc Q_FAKE_NEWS_2. To what extent, if at all, are you concerned about the following and Q_FAKE_NEWS_3. In the LAST WEEK which of the following have you personally come across? Please select all that apply. Base: All markets 2018 – USA: 2401; UK: 2117; Germany: 2038; France: 2006; Italy: 2040; Spain: 2023; Portugal: 2008; Ireland: 2007; Norway: 2027; Sweden: 2016; Finland: 2012; Denmark: 2025; Belgium: 2006; Netherlands: 2010; Switzerland: 2120; Austria: 2010; Hungary: 2005; Slovakia: 2006; Czech Republic: 2020; Poland: 2005; Romania: 2048; Bulgaria: 2021; Croatia: 2010; Greece: 2014; Turkey:2019; Japan: 2033; Korea: 2010; Taiwan: 1008; Hong Kong: 2016; Malaysia: 2013; Singapore: 2018; Australia: 2026; Canada: 2022; Brazil: 2007; Argentina: 2012; Chile: 2008; Mexico: 2007
- 10. 10 3. GOVERNMENT 61% 1. PUBLISHERS 75% 2.PLATFORMS 71% 41%60% “It’s free speech right? (F, 20-29, USA) “content is now removed within a few hours.” (M, 30–45, Germany) See Newman et al (2018) 2018 Reuters Institute Digital News Report. Who bears the biggest responsibility to fix the problems? Q_FAKE_NEWS_4_2_1-3. Please indicate your agreement with the following statements. Technology companies/media companies/the government should do more to make it easier to separate what is real and fake on the internet. Base: All with very low/low/high/very high news literacy: Selected markets = 11149/11898/8069/3790.
- 11. Key points The moveto distributed discovery is demonstrably expanding people’s news diets… … and in many countries we see high levels of concern over what is real and what is fake in the news… … concerns that are fanned by politicized use of the term “f*ke news” and wide attention to it and draw on deep- seated and much broader concerns tied to publishing and politics … … but people often don’t recognize brands, have low levels of trust in news overall, and especially news in search and social… … concerns that lead many to see news media and politicians as among those responsible for key forms of what they see as misinformation.
- 12. @rasmus_kleis EUROPE’S FIGHT AGAINSTDISINFORMATION We are still looking for easy wins and clear enemies. Ideally easy wins that can be delivered via technology, and by technology companies, in a way that doesn’t cost anything and doesn’t piss anyone off. That’s a first important step, and we should keep the pressure up, but (a) it ain’t gonna cut it, and (b) these measures always carry the risk of unintended consequences, including asking already powerful platform companies to exercise even more power, often on an opaque basis. And beyond the Russian government’s information operations, clear, agreed-upon enemies are in short supply – which means that, a year on, we have made little progress especially on two core parts of the problem: powerful people who lie and bottom-up misinformation spread by ordinary people acting in good faith. And so far, most public authorities in Europe have been unable or unwilling to invest in significantly strengthening the institutions that would increase our societal resilience against these problems, perhaps because strengthening independent news media and increasing population-wide media literacy is expensive and slow. If we continue to be up unable to reach a broad-based consensus on what exactly constitutes misinformation we may have to accept that it will be politically impossible (and basically illegitimate in the eyes of the public) to intervene at scale against content, and instead have to focus on (a) combating truly atrocious and demonstrably harmful activity and (b) enhance our resilience to wider problems by supporting independent news media and population-wide media literacy.