During the 2016 presidential election, Russian operatives used Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and other social media platforms to spread disinformation to divide the American electorate. Since then, the social media companies have spent billions of dollars and hired tens of thousands of people to help clean up their act.
But have the platforms really become more sophisticated at handling misinformation?
People are engaging more on Facebook today with news outlets that routinely publish misinformation than they did before the 2016 election, according to new research from the German Marshall Fund Digital, the digital arm of the public policy think tank. The organization, which has a data partnership with the start-up NewsGuard and the social media analytics firm NewsWhip, published its findings on Monday.
In total, Facebook likes, comments and shares of articles from news outlets that regularly publish falsehoods and misleading content roughly tripled from the third quarter of 2016 to the third quarter of 2020, the group found.
moosecakems on October 12nd, 2020 at 15:04 UTC »
I work with people that think Bill Gates is out to get them...
RickNashtag on October 12nd, 2020 at 12:56 UTC »
Delete Facebook
UltraMagnus0001 on October 12nd, 2020 at 11:40 UTC »
Misinformation is probably more popular than the truth