False Information

by Carina Steindl - May 2, 2021

Comparative Analysis of fake and proper Fact-Checking Sites #P5

This post will be another comparison of fake fact-checking sites with real fact-checking sites and how there are differences in their design language (Typography, Images, etc.), the content (Expertise, Rigour, Transparency, Reliability) and the overall usability. It’s hard to find similarities that apply to the various pages, but this post will try to show the most common ones. Therefore I decided to compare InfoWars with ProPublica in the previous post and in this one Global Research with Fact Check.

Global Research vs. Fact Check.

Globalresearch is an “anti-Western” website that has troubles distinguishing between serious analysis and discreditable junk and so just publishes both. While some of GlobalResearch’s articles discuss legitimate humanitarian concerns, its view of science, economics, and geopolitics is conspiracist. The website under the domain names globalresearch.ca, globalresearch.org, globalresearch.com etc., is run by the non-profit The Centre for Research on Globalisation (CRG), which was founded by Michel Chossudovsky (1946–), a professor emeritus of economics at the University of Ottawa.

https://www.globalresearch.ca/

Fact Check is a nonpartisan, nonprofit project of the Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania monitors the factual accuracy of what is said by U.S. political players, including politicians, TV ads, debates, interviews and news releases. Their goal is to apply the best practices of both journalism and scholarship, and to increase public knowledge and understanding.

https://www.factcheck.org/

As you can clearly see common rules of distinguishing if a site is a false information spreading site or not, do not apply to these pages. Some governments already started to implement laws or similar actions against misinformation. Also other scientist and artist startet to visualize this problem.

So last but not least the comparison. Both pages use he SSL certificate which means they should be “safe to use”. While FactCheck.org always has their sources on the end of each article, GlobalResearch.ca only has sources to some articles and also these are called footnotes. Overall both sites do what they are supposed to do, but design related there are some differences. Global Research is really jam-full with articles. There is almost no space in-between the preview blocks and also the font is pretty small. Whereas Fact Check uses a lot more white space and also fonts and images are bigger. So in points of accessibility and readability Fact Check is the clear winner. The website of Global Research just feels like they need to give you all the information in one screen. To describe this phenomenon visually, it feels like some stranger is screaming to your face, but you actually do not understand a thing. The overall usability of both sites is good, but the Fact Check page has a clearer visual structure and a better design language. In terms of functionality everything works fine. Both websites more or less follow the common design principles, even though both sites could be better. During my research I experienced a lot of stuffed content websites and this mainly occurs on fake-news or hoax spreading sites, but unfortunately also some proper fact-checking sites have a really bad visual appearance. So that fact does not tear them apart.

by Carina Steindl - April 9, 2021

Comparative Analysis of fake and proper Fact-Checking Sites #P3

In the third blog entry of this series fake-news websites will be shown to be compared later on. After doing some research, I found a list of websites, who spread fake or misleading news on wikipedia. Most of them were already taken down by the authorities, but some of them still exist and others are just there to redirect you to another weird news or advertisement website. Here is an overview of some of those pages:

70 News.

The first thing I want to mention about these websites is that there is not only false or misleading information on there. Most of the stories published are true to some extent, but every once in a while you will find misleading content on there. 70 News, for example, published a false news story, stating that Donald Trump had won the popular vote in the 2016 United States presidential election; the fake story rose to the top in searches for “final election results” on Google News.

Before It’s News.

This site claims to be a people-powered news site, which published news way before the mainstream media does, but a lot of the content is misleading or completely bogus information. Before It’s News and InfoWars were described as “unabashedly unhinged ‘news’ sites” in 2014 by The Washington Post following its promotion of conspiracy theories relating to Malaysia Airlines Flight 17.

InfoWars.

So it does not take long to figure out what this site tries to achieve with the way they present their content. InfoWars is an American far-right, conspiracy theory and fake news website owned by Alex Jones. It was founded in 1999, and operates under Free Speech Systems LLC.

Fake Bild.de

https://www.news-bitcoin.club/news/index-code.php?lpkey=16ac17bf975b08a028&uclick=x9ejhqkt&uclickhash=x9ejhqkt-x9ejhqkt-gxfe-0-3z0-u3kt-hoa9-ef5864

The picture shown above is also a real common way of hoax and false news spreaders (this time in germany). It is really hard to distinguish between the real and the fake news site. This is called mimicing, where they take a real trustworthy website and just recreate the design under another domain. Most of the time you will not get this site in a google result. To get there you enter another seemingly normal news site and get redirected to a certain domain. Here is a picture of the real Bild.de website to make it more clear:

Daily Buzz Live.

This website is dedicated to bringing bizarre stories for the sole purpose of getting traffic to its website. They work with PopUps, as you can see in the picture and these kind of sites create mostly bogus stories and claims. To be fair, if you have some experience with the world wide wed, you will not take this website seriously.

Global Research.

Last but not least, this is the most dangerous form of false information websites, because it mimics other fact-checking sites and creates a common disbelieve in every website there is. Wikipedia states: “Principal website of the Centre for Research on Globalization, which The Economist in April 2017 called “a hub for conspiracy theories and fake stories,” and NATO information warfare specialists in November 2017 linked to a concerted effort to undermine the credibility of mainstream Western media.” Despite this information the website is still online and still spreading misleading content through the world wide web.

So these are just a few examples of what is actually out there and everyday I find something new. This is not a new phenomenon, as I already explained in a prior post, but it is a massively growing industry and it is just there to manipulate people. Next up is a comparison of these pages with real fact-checking sites and how there are differences in their design language, usability and so on.

If you want to know more false information spreading sites, here is a link to a list:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fake_news_websites

by Carina Steindl - January 24, 2021January 24, 2021

Fact Checking Sites

As mentioned in recent posts there are multiple reasons for the rise and existence of false or misleading information in the digital age. Some of them occur because of a data void, but there are also other reasons like the so-called filter bubbles, where an algorithm selectively guesses what information a user would like to see based on information about the user, such as location, past click-behavior and search history. This term was coined by internet activist Eli Pariser in 2010 and also discussed in his 2011 book of the same name. As a result, users get isolated from information that might differ from their own opinion. This leads to less discourse of information and again might be harmful for our civic discourse.

The extrem negativ effects a filter bubble can have is shown in the following video THE MISEDUCATION OF DYLANN ROOF (Trigger warning: Violence, Racism and racial slurs, Hateful language directed at religious groups).

https://www.splcenter.org/files/miseducation-dylann-roof

Here is a short video of things to look for when you are uncertain or just want to know what to look for when surfing the world wide web:

Spotting Bogus Claims

Despite the things to look for mentioned in the video, sometimes that is not enough. If you watched the video about the miseducation of dylann roof, you will clearly realize that websites which spread false information or hate speech are sometimes designed in a similar way to other reliable news pages, which can make it difficult for not savvy users to identify propaganda and misinformation.

Since 2010 a lot of fact checking sites appeared. Most of them rely on the same principle. They use donations to do their work and they write articles about current rumors.

Fact checking sites like FactCheck.org or the The Washingtion Post Fact Checker like to comment on mostly false information spread by politicians and such. However, they do not show or label content compared to the social media platforms, on which false information is spread throughout the platforms and also shared to other social interaction platforms. You will find statistics about that here.

Other sites like PolitiFact show statements and their truthfulness in form of an “Truth-O-Meter”. In my personal opinion the design of the quotes and the “Truth-O-Meter” does not look really sophisticated and believable. In the next post I want to do a survey about the credibility of these sites and their designs.

Another fact checking organization or institute is IFCN. This website is really transparent and well designed. Its function is described as follows: “The code of principles of the International Fact-Checking Network at Poynter is a series of commitments organizations abide by to promote excellence in fact-checking. We believe nonpartisan and transparent fact-checking can be a powerful instrument of accountability journalism.”

They use a clear and consistent design language, like corporate colors and fonts. The International Fact-Checking Network is a unit of the Poynter Institute dedicated to bringing together fact-checkers worldwide. Also they use a corporate badge to verify organizations, which looks like this:

Around 100 fact checking or news organizations all over the world use this service or way of validating, even tough it is not an easy application process. Next to other reasons why implementing such a verification is important, the good design is clearly making the site more sophisticated.

Some Fact Checking Sites and Organizations:

https://www.factcheck.org/

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/fact-checker/

https://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/

https://www.opensecrets.org/

https://www.ifcncodeofprinciples.poynter.org/

Next up: Survey about fact checking websites credibility, Systems/Icons to label content, Which labels do we need?

by Carina Steindl - December 20, 2020January 17, 2021

How do we interact with misinformation? Part 1

An empirical user research questionnaire about how we interact with social media platforms and false or misleading content. Furthermore how the design influences us and if labeling content is helpful?

In 2018 the European Union did a survey on “The digital transformation of news media and the rise of disinformation and fake news”. In this report they stated that misinformation or fake news is pretty old. The first known case of fake news goes back to the 16th century. However, this may be an argument for some people, it is clear by now that social media and the spread of fake news and misinformation have become a problem. First of all we need to define some wordings:

Falsity

Falsity refers to inconsistency in claimed facts (Spears, 2015), for instance, when a car manufacture claims that the car’s gas mileage is higher than it actually is.

Misleading

Some content creates an impression about a product, a story or news that is untrue (fake) or about features, information or facts that do not exist.

Misleading and false content affects the choices of users and their opinions.

The Questionnaire

In this phase of the research some personal qualitativ interviews based on a standardized questionnaire with a few participants will be conducted and analyzed. The main interest of this survey is how people interact with fake or misleading information and how we can change the apperance or interaction process through design. Therefore the following questions will be asked:

Demographic data like gender, age, education level, employment and family status.
Where do you usually watch/read news or get information on certain topics?
Which social media platforms do you use?
How often do you visit these platforms daily/weekly/monthly?
Have you ever experienced misleading content on these platforms? If so, please elaborate.
How do you interact with misleading or false content? Please elaborate.
What is your reaction when you find out the content you found is misleading or false?
What do you think about labeled content?
Which additional (background) information of a statement/fact is important to be shown directly for you as a viewer?
What makes a website/content/information trustworthy?
How trustworthy is social media in your personal opinion and why? (Scale 1 – 10)
Do you think the design of information or content has an effect? If so, please elaborate.
Do you want do add something?

Links/Reports:

(PDF) Impact of misleading/false advertisement to consumer behaviour. International Journal of Economics and Business Research, 2018 Vol.16 No.4, pp.453 – 465. Available from: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/328067596_Impact_of_misleadingfalse_advertisement_to_consumer_behaviour_International_Journal_of_Economics_and_Business_Research_2018_Vol16_No4_pp453_-_465 [accessed Dec 20 2020].

Study on fake news and disinformation from the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre.

FactsheetTacklingthespreadofdisinformationonline Download

by Carina Steindl - December 13, 2020January 17, 2021

Digital Truth

Introduction to the topic Digital Truth.

In times of new media and fake news it is hard to know which facts are actually true and which are not but why is this a problem for humanity?

You might think that some misinformation might not be harmful, but a workshop of Yale Law School and the Floyd Abrams Institute for Freedom of Expression showed that fake news can have a bad influence on our society. This problem exists not only in politics but also in our daily life. But what means bad influence and how can we make the online world more transparent?

Since the beginning of time humans were never exposed to such tons of data as we know today. At the beginning of the internet age people did not really use or understand the power of the world wide web. It started around the turn of the century that humans got connected and since then it increased exponentially. The devices got easier to use and the screen design improved as well. Originally most of the information online was reduced to fun articles and some early staged websites with mostly bad usability but that changed quickly. More and more humans became as we call them “Users” and at the same time the amount of misinformation rose and the transparency decreased. Nowadays it is hard to distinguish what information is correct and what is only there to get our emotions out of control. Bots and people who distribute false stories for profit or engage in ideological propaganda are now part of our everyday life as we spend around up to seven hours a day in front of a screen. Since the beginning of the pandemic our daily screen time might have increased even more. The positive or negative health effects of screen time are influenced by quality and content of exposure. The most salient danger associated with “fake news” is the fact that it devalues and delegitimizes voices of expertise, authoritative institutions, and the concept of objective data – all of which undermines society’s ability to engage in rational discourse based upon shared facts.

Reseach result of the American Press Institute

In 2014 some researches tried to cluster algorithms which have emerged as a powerful meta-learning tool to analyze massive volumes of data generated by time-based media. They developed a categorizing framework and highlighted the set of clustering algorithms which were best performing for big data. However, one of their major issues was that it caused confusion amongst practitioners because of the lack of consensus in the definition of their properties as well as a lack of formal categorization. Clustering data is the first step for finding patterns which may lead us to detecting misinformation, false stories, ideological propaganda or so-called fake news. It is also a method for unsupervised learning. Furthermore, it is a common technique for statistical data analysis used in many other fields of science and if used correctly it could be a game changer for our online and offline society.

PEW Research Center Internet and Technology

Why does Fake News exist?

A pretty important thing to know about social media, is that always the most recent published or shared content is the first you will see. That means if there is no reliable recent post on a topic, it leaves a so-called data void behind, which means as soon as somebody publishes something new on this topic, it will be shown first. This comes from the fact that we always long for “new” news, despite the fact that no one, no tool nor algorithm has ever screened these information verifying its accuracy.

Example of how data voids work

What about Twitter?

Since May 2020 Twitter is trying to make it easy or easier to find credible information and to limit the spread of potentially harmful and misleading content. They introduced new labels and warning messages that will provide additional context and information on some Tweets. These labels will link to a Twitter-curated page or external trusted sources containing additional information on the claims made within the Tweet.

Twitter labels for false information about COVID-19

Twitter warnings for conflicting content

So Twitter is one of the major social media platforms actually labeling content, despite it being the Tweet of the current president of America alias Donald J. Trump. Also they are actively trying to decrease the spread of misinformation though introducing an extra notice before you can share conflicting content. Since content can take many different forms, they started clustering the false or misleading content into three broad categories:

categories of false or misleading content

Of course Twitter is not the only platform labeling false information or content going viral – Facebook and Instagram started doing that too. Instagram has been working with third-party fact checkers, but up until now the service was far less aggressive with misinformation than Facebook. Also qualitativ fact checking takes time, which can be problematic and there is still some catching up to do.

Instagram adds 'false information' labels to prevent fake news from going viral — Facebook and Instagram – labeled content

Labeling or removing postings is a first approach in the right direction, but it does not solve all issues that come with false information and how we interact with it. This is why this topic is so important for the future and the wellbeing of our society.

Sources:

Fighting Fake News Workshop Report hosted by The Information Society Project & The Floyd Abrams Institute for Freedom of Expression

Links:

https://blog.twitter.com/en_us/topics/product/2020/updating-our-approach-to-misleading-information.html

https://towardsdatascience.com/the-5-clustering-algorithms-data-scientists-need-to-knowa36d136ef68

https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/A-Survey-of-Clustering-Algorithms-for-Big-Data%3A-and-

https://researchguides.austincc.edu/c.php?g=612891&p=4258046 /I

https://unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000265552

https://muckrack.com/blog/2017/02/27/fake-news-bubble

https://www.americanpressinstitute.org/publications/elections/trusted-elections-network/talking-about-misinformation-with-first-draft/