Misinformation prevails on the social site Facebook

by time news

Disinformation is rife on the popular social platform Facebook, according to a study by researchers at New York University and the University of Grenoble in France.

A study conducted during the national elections from August 2020 to January 2021 found that disinformation attracted six times more reactions (in the form of “likes,” “shares,” and other promotions) than information from reliable sources. “This study provides additional evidence that, despite the measures being taken, disinformation found a comfortable haven and an interested audience on this platform,” said Rebecca Tromble, director of the Institute for Information, Democracy and Politics at George Washington University, who analyzed the study’s findings.

Facebook executives dispute this interpretation of the study’s findings. Network spokesman Joe Osborne pointed out that the number of people associated with the publication of this kind of disinformation on the network’s website (namely, they were taken into account by the researchers) is significantly less than the number of people who actually saw or read it.

This advantage of disinformation over the reports of major news outlets and public institutions such as the World Health Organization has a place on both the far-left and far-right sites, the research report notes, but far more on far-right sites. And the impact of this kind of misinformation should not be underestimated. A recent poll showed that American Facebook users are less likely than any other news consumer to be vaccinated against the coronavirus.

Published in the newspaper “Moskovsky Komsomolets” No. 0 dated November 30 -0001

Newspaper headline:
Is a lie stronger than the truth?

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