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Misinformation is one of the twenty-first century's greatest challenges, a peril to democracy, peace, science, and public health. Yet we lack a clear understanding of what makes misinformation so potent and why it can spread so rapidly. In Falsehoods Fly, a leading cognitive scientist and philosopher offers a new framework for recognizing and countering misleading claims by exploring the ways that information works—and breaks down.Paul Thagard examines the dangers of misinformation on COVID-19, climate change, conspiracy theories, inequality, and the Russian invasion of Ukraine. He argues that effective responses to these problems require understanding how information is generated and spread. Bringing together empirical findings about the psychological and social mechanisms that drive cognitive errors with philosophical accounts of critical thinking, Thagard develops an innovative theory of how we gain information. Grasping how the generation and transmission of knowledge can fail helps us find ways to repair it and provides tools for converting misinformation into facts. Offering a deep and rich account of the nature and workings of information, Falsehoods Fly provides practical, concrete strategies to stop the creation and spread of misinformation.

With the revolution in information technology, concerns about the proliferation of false, unverified, and misleading information have been growing. As one of the severe public health crises in modern history, the COVID-19 pandemic has provided a novel context for the'post-truth'research. In a'post-truth'era, people are no longer interested in investigating objective facts, but tend to curl up in echo chambers and resonate with like-minded others. Against this backdrop, this book (1) systematically conceptualises'post-truth'and analyzes its defining characteristics and driving forces, (2) examines the nuanced effects of information sources and news consumption behaviours and strategies on COVID-19 misperceptions and knowledge, (3) explores the role of social media in shaping COVID-19-related misperceptions and knowledge, and (4) highlights the importance of news media literacy in navigating the'post-truth'era.The book will be essential reading for students and scholars of media and film studies, communication studies and comparative studies. It will also be a useful reference for medical and media professionals such as doctors, nurses and journalists.

How did we become a world where facts—shared truths—have lost their power to hold us together as a community, as a country, globally? How have we allowed the proliferation of alternative facts, hoaxes, even conspiracy theories, to destroy our trust in institutions, leaders, and legitimate experts? Best-selling journalist Steven Brill documents the forces and people, from Silicon Valley to Madison Avenue to Moscow to Washington, that have created and exploited this world of chaos and division—and offers practical solutions for what we can do about it.'A precise description of the punishment cell we have built around our minds and the first few steps back towards light and air.'–Timothy Snyder, Author of On Tyranny and Professor of History, Yale University“A seminal, ground-breaking, documented and honest examination of two of the central dilemmas of our time—what is truth and where to find it.” —Bob Woodward, associate editor at The Washington PostAs the cofounder of NewsGuard, a company that tracks online misinformation, Steven Brill has observed the rise of fake news from a front-row seat. In The Death of Truth, with startling, often terrifying clarity, he explains how we got here—and how we can get back to a world where truth matters.None of this—conspiracy theories embraced, expertise ridiculed, empirical evidence ignored—has happened by accident. Brill takes us inside the decisions made by executives in Silicon Valley to code the algorithms embedded in their social media platforms to maximize profits by pushing divisive content. He unravels the ingenious creation of automated advertising buying systems that reward that click-baiting content and penalize reliable news publishers, and describes how the use of these ad-financed, misinformation platforms by politicians, hucksters, and conspiracy theorists deceives ordinary citizens. He documents how the most powerful adversaries of America have used American-made social media and advertising tools against us with massive disinformation campaigns—and how, with the development of generative artificial intelligence, everything could get exponentially worse unless we act. The stakes are high for all of us, including Brill himself, whose company's role in exposing Russian disinformation operations resulted in a Russian agent targeting him and his family.Crucially, Brill lays out a series of provocative but realistic prescriptions for what we can do now to reverse course—proposals certain to stir debate and even action that could curb the power of big tech to profit from division and chaos, tamp down polarization, and restore the trust necessary to bring us together.

For as long as there has been a press, fake news has played a role in the disruption of how factual information is shared among people. Misinformation goes back even further, spreading through the use of lies and rumors, spoken or written, for various political and social purposes. In this book, we will trace a brief history of fake news, examine its antecedents and precursors, before looking at the way it is currently employed using digital information technologies. The current consensus on what comprises fake news is somewhat contested; as such, a more detailed look at the phenomenon is in order. Not only does fake news include false news stories spread with the intent to deceive, its purpose can be instructive and parodic, providing the very tools needed to puncture misinformation bubbles. This book will examine in detail a comprehensive model for fake news that might be used to help predict and neutralize its negative effects, as well as examine the traits that contribute to a person's susceptibility to falling for false stories, conspiracies, and other misinformation.In this regard, the book is unique in its approach to fake news, seeing it as situated within a matrix of behaviors, conditions, and contexts that must be accounted for before its effects can be completely neutralized. The context also explores the relationship of the creator and the user of fake news, speculating on the intertwined actions and motives of both. It is hypothesized that specific conditions exploited by ‘bad actors'would contribute to the spread of fake news and that low levels or lack of certain identifiable characteristics in users (i.e. ability to scaffold, conduct parallel thinking, be aware of one's ignorance, know one's strengths and weaknesses) would also make it more likely to be consumed and shared. This book also examines the wider impacts of fake news on societies, especially in the areas of education, politics, and public policy. This book makes the case for developing strategies that rely not merely upon information literacy to help individuals deal with fake news, but also on wider national and international policies that specifically aid users of information and address human behavioral characteristics. As in information behavior research, the scale and scope of examining fake news requires both a local focus and a large-scale inquiry into societal and cultural norms

Deep Fakes: Algorithms and Society focuses on the use of artificial intelligence technologies to produce fictitious photorealistic audiovisual clips that are indistinguishable from traditional video media.For over a century, the indexical relationship of the photographic image, and its related media of film and video, to the scene of capture has served as a basis for truth claims. Historically, the iconicity of these images has featured a causal traceback to actual light rays in a particular time and space, which were fixed by chemical reactions or digital sensors to the resultant image. Today, photorealistic audiovisual media can be generated from deep learning networks that sever any connection to an actual event. Should society instantiate new regimes to manage this new challenge to our sense of reality and the traditional evidential capacities of the ‘mechanical image'? How do these images generate information disorder while also providing the basis for legitimate tools used in entertainment and creative industries?Scholars and students from many backgrounds, as well as policymakers, journalists and the general reading public, will find a multidisciplinary approach to questions posed by deep fake research from Communication, International Studies, Writing and Rhetoric.

Deepfakes is a synthetic media that leverage powerful Artificial Intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) techniques to generate fake visual and audio content that are extremely realistic, thus making it very hard for a human to distinguish from the original ones. Apart from technological introduction to the Deepfakes concept, the book details algorithms to detect Deepfakes, techniques for identifying manipulated content and identifying face swap, generative adversarial neural networks, media forensic techniques, deep learning architectures, forensic analysis of DeepFakes and so forth. Provides a technical introduction to DeepFakes, its benefits, and the potential harms Presents practical approaches of creation and detection of DeepFakes using Deep Learning (DL) Techniques Draws attention towards various challenging issues and societal impact of DeepFakes with their existing solutions Includes research analysis in the domain of DL fakes for assisting the creation and detection of DeepFakes applications Discusses future research directions with emergence of DeepFakes technology This book is aimed at graduate students, researchers and professionals in data science, artificial intelligence, computer vision, and machine learning.

This book explores cultural polarization resultant decline in social cohesion in society and how information and communication technologies exacerbate the cultural polarization through phenomenon such as “echo chambers” of information that damage the quality of online discourse. This book examines the nature of the information that is shared. Further this book identifies how the quality of online discourse and polarization induced through it leads to offline harm and negative outcomes in our society. This book discusses how wide-ranging information exchange on digital media can lead to two scenarios, namely, the formation of the public sphere or the formation of echo chambers. While the public sphere, which promotes greater diversity, is a well-researched domain, substantially less research has been conducted on echo chambers in relation to sociocultural activities, products or services. This book states that polarization induced by the formation and evolution of echo chambers in sociocultural realm such as around epidemic outbreaks, vaccination, healthcare, education, and climate change is an emerging avenue of research due to its enormous impact in the shaping of our society. Therefore, this book argues that understanding the characteristics of sociocultural products related controversies is critical and valuable in developing interventions to reduce unhealthy societal and organizational polarisations. The development of systematic knowledge is required to understand and address such a large scale and complex societal challenge so as to facilitate a deeper understanding and offer solutions to the growing issue of polarization in sociocultural context driven primarily through echo chambers. This book examines how technology enabled social media usage increases, and the complex structural outcomes such as echo chambers are likely to have an increasingly important role in shaping public opinion. This book appeals to readerswith interest in developing a deeper and broader understanding of issues and initiatives related to the polarization of opinions on cultural products. These include readers and scholars from various disciplines, along with engaged organizational leaders, activists, policy makers, and common citizens.

From fringe conspiracy theories to'alternative facts', a timely look at how we arrived in the'fake news'era.Would your younger self believe the news of today? An entire city block blown up by a suicide bomber on Christmas Day because he believed phone towers spread disease. A Representative elected to the US Congress on a platform that Democrats are secretly harvesting an anti-aging chemical from the blood of abused children. Angry rioters in furs and horns overrun the Capitol in a bloody carnage of insurrection. The Prime Minister of Australia employing the wife of his friend who fronts a group the FBI has declared terrorists. A global pandemic which, even as they lie dying from it, people refuse to believe exists.Many who sat in shocked disbelief as these events beamed around the world asked the same question:'How did we get here?'For those rioters, it was the culmination of a journey of online radicalisation that began with the weaponisation of disinformation by their political leaders and outrageously biased'news'commentators.Facts and Other Lies puts fake news in its historical context and explains how disinformation has fractured society, even threatening democracy itself. It explains why disinformation is so potent and so hard to stop, and what we can do to help prevent its proliferation in Australia - where politicians and shock jocks are already operating from the same dark playbook. It outlines how anyone can defuse disinformation in the home, office or pub, or wherever the deluded gather to spread their nonsense. Be prepared!'This is a timely account of a growing malignancy affecting all modern democracies'Kevin Rudd, former Prime Minister of Australia'Ed Coper keenly explains how lying has been normalised in right wing media - both social and mainstream. The Trump-inspired attack on the US Capitol on 6 January is just one consequence. Coper deftly shows us what is to be done and offers some real solutions to restore trust in public discourse.'Malcolm Turnbull, former Prime Minister of Australia'Fascinating and terrifying... illuminates so much about humans and social media'Bri Lee, author of Who Gets to Be Smart'Read this book if you want to save democracy'Wayne Swan, former Deputy Prime Minister of Australia'Few have mapped our information dystopia more effectively - and entertainingly - than Coper'Bernard Keane, Politics Editor, Crikey'Essential reading for anyone wanting to cut through the nonsense and get to the truth'Eason Jordan, former Chief News Executive, CNN'We live in a world that unfolds at a pace, and with the violent twists and turns in the plot, of a thriller. This book captures the intensity of our politics and connects it to the science of misinformation... a great read'Professor Stephan Lewandowsky, Chair in Cognitive Psychology, University of Bristol

This interdisciplinary collection of essays explores the impact of media, emerging technologies, and education on the resilience of the so-called post-truth society. This book explores if a return to civic participation, enhanced critical media literacy, journalism for the public good, techno-interventions and lifelong learning systems can collectively foster a more engaged global citizenry. The post-truth society is associated with a raft of terms that challenge the very notion of what should constitute a democratic and inclusive society: the decline and fall of reason; the disruption of the public sphere; the spread of misleading information; fake news; culture wars; the rise of subjectivity; the co-opting of language; filters, silos and tribes; attention deficits; trolls, polarisation and hyper-partisanship; the conversion of popularity into legitimacy; manipulation by'populist'; leaders, governments, and fringe actors; algorithmic control, targeted messaging and native advertising; surveillance and platform capitalism. The contributions from scholars, technologists, policy-makers and activists raise critical questions about the nature and power of knowledge in the 21st century. Readers are challenged to question their own role in perpetuating certain narratives and to also understand the lived context of people on all sides of a given debate. The diverse perspectives by geography, sector, gender and world-views will widen the appeal of this work to an international audience trying to understand the resilience of the post-truth society.

Drawing on research from multiple disciplines and international case studies, this book provides a comprehensive and up-to-date understanding of online disinformation and its potential countermeasures. Disinformation and Manipulation in Digital Media presents a model of the disinformation process which incorporates four cross-cutting dimensions or themes: bad actors, platforms, audiences, and countermeasures. The dynamics of each dimension are analysed alongside a diverse range of international case studies drawn from different information domains including politics, health, and society. In elucidating the interrelationship between the four dimensions of online disinformation and their manifestation in different international contexts, the book demonstrates that online disinformation is a complex problem with multiple, overlapping causes and no easy solutions. The book's conclusion contextualises the problem of disinformation within broader social and political trends and discusses the relevance of radical innovations in democratic participation to counteract the post-truth environment. This up-to-date and thorough analysis of the disinformation landscape will be of interest to students and scholars in the fields of journalism, communications, politics, and policy as well as policymakers, technologists, and media practitioners.This research received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 825227.

The COVID-19 pandemic crisis has changed the way we live and communicate. The phases of lockdown brought about by the pandemic fundamentally changed the way we work, lead our everyday lives, and how we communicate, resulting in Internet platforms becoming more important than ever before. Communicating COVID-19 explores the impact of these changes on society and the way we communicate, and the effect this has had on the spread of misinformation. Critical communication and Internet scholar Christian Fuchs analyses the changes of everyday communication in the COVID-19 crisis and how misinformation has spread online throughout the pandemic. He explores the foundations and rapid spread of conspiracy theories and anti-vaccination discourse on the Internet, paying particular attention to the vast amount of COVID-19 conspiracy theories about Bill Gates. He also interrogates Internet users'reactions to these COVID-19 conspiracy theories as well as how Donald Trump communicated about COVID-19 on Twitter during the final year of his Presidency. Communicating COVID-19 is an essential work for anyone seeking to understand the role of digital technologies, changes in communication and the Internet, and the spread of conspiracy theories in the context of COVID-19.