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Trump Inviting Influencers to White House Press Briefings Is Likely to Usher in a New Era of Fake News
The steady rise in prominence of partisan influencers using increasingly dangerous language is only likely to lead to the American public having less faith in the institutions that are critical to a functioning democracy –the press included.
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In Times of Crisis, States Have Few Tools to Fight Misinformation
While officials in Southern California fought fire and falsehoods, Meta —the parent company of Facebook and Instagram —announced it would eliminate its fact-checking program in the name of free expression. As social media companies are pushing back against efforts to crack down on falsehoods, questions are asked about what, if anything, state governments can do to stop the spread of harmful lies and rumors that proliferate on social media.
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Fighting Deepfakes: What’s Next After legislation?
Deepfake technology is weaponizing artificial intelligence in a way that disproportionately targets women, especially those working public roles, compromising their dignity, safety, and ability to participate in public life.
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Climate Misinformation Is Rife on Social Media – and Poised to Get Worse
The decision by Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, to end its fact-checking program and otherwise reduce content moderation would open the floodgates to more climate misinformation on Meta’s apps, including misleading or out-of-context claims during disasters. Crowd-sourced debunking is no match for organized disinformation campaigns in the midst of information vacuums during a crisis. The conditions for the rapid and unchecked spread of misleading, and outright false, content could get worse with Meta’s content moderation policy and algorithmic changes.
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The World's Top Global Risk Is Misinformation and Disinformation: World Economic Forum
Mis- and disinformation have once again been named the top global risk of the immediate term in the annual World Economic Forum (WEF) Global Risks Report 2025. Disinformation is deeply insidious, destructive and rapidly evolving. It often comes hand-in-hand with its less malicious but equally destructive cousin, misinformation.
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The Dynamics That Polarize Us on Social Media Are About to Get Worse
Meta founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg has announced Facebook, Instagram and Threads, instead of relying on independent third-party factcheckers, will now emulate Elon Musk’s X in using “community notes.”But research shows that political polarization prevents community fact-checking from even occurring – and, what is worse, community-notes systems are vulnerable to manipulation by well organized groups, and foreign governments, with political agendas.
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What Meta’s Move to Community Moderation Could Mean for Misinformation
Achieving the right balance between protecting free speech and ensuring the integrity of information is a complex challenge. Meta’s shift from professional factchecking to crowdsourced community moderation risks undermining this balance by amplifying the spread of disinformation and hateful speech. Free expression without proper safeguards can enable the unchecked proliferation of harmful content, including conspiracy theories, hate speech and medical misinformation.
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Meta to Move Content Moderators to Texas as Part of Plan to End Fact-Checking Program
The tech giant’s decision to end the program comes as CEO Mark Zuckerberg seeks to mend ties with the incoming Trump administration.
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Cartels Turn to Social Media to Lure Americans into Human Smuggling as Texas Enforces Stricter Laws
Thousands of people have been arrested under Texas’ human smuggling law. Now they face at least a decade in prison under sentencing guidelines that took effect this year.
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AI Fact Checks Can Increase Belief in False Headlines
Many tech companies and start-ups have touted the potential of automated fact-checking services powered by artificial intelligence to stem the rising tide of online misinformation, but a new study has found that AI-fact checking can, in some cases, actually increase belief in false headlines.
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It’s Not Too Late to Regulate Persuasive Technologies
Prominent Chinese tech companies are developing and deploying powerful persuasive tools to work for the Chinese Communist Party’s propaganda, military and public security services—and many of them have already become global leaders in their fields. TikTok is only the tip of the iceberg.
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How Does the Information Ecosystem Influence Politics?
A new course combines data and political science to understand some of the most vital phenomena of our time. “Persuasion is happening at scale on information platforms,” says an expert, “so we now have the chance to understand this question statistically.”
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Misinformation Really Does Spread Like a Virus, Suggest Mathematical Models Drawn from Epidemiology
When it comes to misinformation, “going viral” appears to be more than a simple catchphrase. Scientists have found a close analogy between the spread of misinformation and the spread of viruses: how misinformation gets around can be effectively described using mathematical models designed to simulate the spread of pathogens.
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University of Central Florida Students Secure Gold at the DOE’s 10th CyberForce Competition
Students gained hands-on practical cybersecurity experience and recognition by securing a wind energy generation plant against simulated cyberattacks.
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EFF to Court: Reject X’s Effort to Revive a Speech-Chilling Lawsuit Against a Nonprofit
X’s lawsuit against the nonprofit Center for Countering Digital Hate is intended to stifle criticism and punish the organization for its reports criticizing the platform’s content moderation practices, and a previous ruling dismissing the lawsuit should be affirmed.
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The long view
What Does Netflix’s Drama “Adolescence” Tell Us About Incels and the Manosphere?
While Netflix’s psychological crime drama ‘Adolescence’ is a work of fiction, its themes offer insight into the very real and troubling rise of the incel and manosphere culture online.