Tag - misinformation

 
 

MISINFORMATION

Marine Le Pen's far-right National Rally surged in French legislative elections last year. Despite social media being a key megaphone for political campaigning, issues like voter dissatisfaction still play a determinant role in electoral outcomes.
COMMENTARY / World / Geoeconomic Briefing
Feb 5, 2025
Social media alone didn’t decide last year’s elections
Last year's record number of elections around the world hold some important lessons. One is that social media wasn't the key determinant of outcomes that many made it out to be.
A member of the former rebel group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham stands guard near an image of Assad at the fourth division headquarters in Damascus on Jan. 23.
WORLD / Politics
Feb 3, 2025
Digital discord: Online disinformation sows discontent in Syria
There are fears online disinformation is derailing the transition of power after Sunni Islamist rebels defeated Assad in December.
Many attribute the far right’s recent global rise to “anti-incumbency” bias, but this overlooks how the COVID-19 crisis fostered division and distrust, turning voters against their governments. 
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 2, 2025
Confronting the pandemic’s toxic political legacy
Libertarian resentment over past restrictions and mandates is one thing; an abiding distrust of scientists is quite another.
Phishing and its social-engineering cousin "pretexting" together accounted for more than 20% of almost 10,000 data breaches worldwide last year.
WORLD / Society
Jan 30, 2025
Age of deepfakes means internet users must be more alert than ever
AI chatbots powered by large language models save attackers time and allow for more elaborate fake messages.
Relatives of people who died in Spain's disastrous floods, as well as protesters, demonstrate against Valencia's regional leader, demanding his resignation for his handling of the emergency, in Valencia, Spain, on Dec. 29.
WORLD / Politics
Jan 30, 2025
Chinese online operation called for toppling Spain's government: report
The online operation from China, called Spamouflage, has been operating in several countries since 2017, online analysis outfit Graphika said.
Fujitsu and the National Institute of Informatics have launched a full-scale industry-academia collaboration to curb the spread of disinformation, including deepfakes created through generative artificial intelligence.
JAPAN / FOCUS
Jan 27, 2025
Japan launches industry and academia tie-up to combat online disinformation
Nine companies and academic institutions aim to put an integrated system for combating false information into use by March 2026.
Mark Zuckerberg’s push to loosen moderation policies at Meta puts the company on a collision course with regulations in Brazil, Latin America’s largest economy.
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 24, 2025
Zuckerberg's newfound libertarianism is worrying Brazil
Meta's loosened moderation policy puts it on a collision course with regulations in Latin America’s largest economy.
Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk gestures as he speaks during the inaugural parade at Capitol One Arena in Washington on Monday.
WORLD
Jan 23, 2025
Musk calls for defunding of Wikipedia over description of gesture
A recent war of words pits the two tech giants against each other and highlights the starkly different ethos behind Musk's X and Wikipedia.
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg
BUSINESS
Jan 20, 2025
Meta's move to halt fact-checking program in U.S. prompts concern
Instead of using trusted media organizations to fact-check, Meta plans to use "community notes" to check content.
A nurse prepares a dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine on Dec. 27, 2020, at Santa Maria Hospital in Lisbon, Portugal. Five years since COVID-19 started upending the world, the virus is still infecting and killing people across the globe — though at far lower levels than during the height of the pandemic.
WORLD / Society
Jan 20, 2025
Vaccine misinformation: A lasting side effect from COVID-19
Concerns have emerged over whether vaccine hesitancy could inhibit the world's ability to fend off another pandemic.
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and then-Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump greet each other at a campaign event sponsored by conservative group Turning Point USA, in Duluth, Georgia, in October.
WORLD / Politics
Jan 18, 2025
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. sought to stop COVID-19 shots six months after rollout
Donald Trump's pick to lead U.S. health agencies, petitioned the FDA to revoke authorization of the shots at a time when they were in high demand and considered life-saving.
The prospect of a TikTok ban has already triggered some users to seek alternatives, with Chinese social media app RedNote gaining nearly 3 million U.S. users in one day earlier this week.
BUSINESS / Companies
Jan 17, 2025
TikTok's fight against going dark gains support from key U.S. lawmakers
A law passed in April mandates owner ByteDance to divest TikTok's U.S. assets by Sunday to a non-Chinese buyer, or be banned on national security concerns.
Palestinians pass through an Israeli checkpoint as they make their way to Jerusalem's al-Aqsa compound, known to Jews as the Temple Mount, in the West Bank, in March 2024. Israeli forces have frequently used disguises to infiltrate Gaza and target Hamas operatives.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Jan 12, 2025
In the art of war, mimicry runs the gambit from disguises to deepfakes
Impersonation is one of the oldest tactics in war, because it exploits our social nature and persists because humans are dependent on identities for cooperation.
Social media giant Meta slashed its content moderation policies on Tuesday, including ending its U.S. fact-checking program, in a major shift that conforms with the priorities of incoming president Donald Trump.
BUSINESS / Tech
Jan 8, 2025
Big Tech rolls out the red carpet for Trump ahead of his inauguration
Since the November election, a stream of senior moguls have traveled to meet with Trump at his Florida estate.
Demonstrators inside the U.S. Capitol after breaching barricades on Jan. 6, 2021
WORLD / Society
Jan 8, 2025
Violent extremism lingers online with U.S. flagging less content
Donald Trump’s return to the White House promises to cement the hands-off approach toward online behavior.
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg tries on a pair of Orion augmented reality glasses at the Meta Connect annual event at the company's headquarters in Menlo Park, California, on Sept. 25.
BUSINESS / Tech
Jan 8, 2025
Meta shelves fact-checking in policy reversal ahead of Trump inauguration
It plans to implement on Facebook, Instagram and Threads a system of "community notes" similar to that used on rival X.
Supporters of impeached South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol rally near his official residence in Seoul on Friday morning. Right-wing YouTube​rs helped Yoon win his election. They are now his allies in the wake of his botched imposition of martial law.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Jan 5, 2025
How fear and conspiracy theories fuel South Korea’s political crisis
Right-wing YouTube​rs helped President Yoon Suk Yeol​ win his election. They are now his allies in the wake of his botched imposition of martial law.
Supporters of impeached South Korea President Yoon Suk Yeol hold up placards reading "Opposition to impeachment, Arrest Lee Jae-myung," leader of the opposition Democratic Party, as they gather near the presidential residence in Seoul on Wednesday.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Jan 2, 2025
Right-wing YouTubers back impeached South Korean president's last stand
A small band of supporters spurred on by the YouTubers have refused to leave impeached leader Yoon Suk Yeol's side as he attempts to fend off arrest.
A woman receives a COVID-19 vaccine in Minato Ward, Tokyo, in October.
JAPAN / Science & Health
Dec 29, 2024
Meiji Seika Pharma files suit against lawmaker over 'unfounded' vaccine claims
CDP Lower House lawmaker Kazuhiro Haraguchi has said that the drugmaker's replicon vaccine is "akin to a biological weapon."
A disinformation graphic spread via Telegram before a Russian offensive in Ukraine's Kharkiv region. The Kremlin has deployed its sophisticated propaganda machinery to justify its offensive in Ukraine, and China is learning from Russian influence tactics.
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 25, 2024
China is taking a page from Russia’s disinformation playbook
Russian and Chinese influence operations are increasingly similar and complementary, showing how the two regimes are collaborating to dominate the information space.

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