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ISSUE: The independent media RFA (Radio Free Asia) funded by the US government, spread misinformation about Chinese coronavirus vaccines, misleading readers and taking phrases our of context, thereby lowering the confidence in medicines against the virus that can stop pandemic due to political strifes.

EVIDENCES:
1. In an article dated November 10, the RFA wrote about deaths from the Chinese vaccine in Brazil, although in fact the authoritative Reuters publication on November 9 confirmed that the death was due to suicide. The RFA information was taken out of context.
2.In another article, the RFA stated that a medical study in Peru found out that the effectiveness of Sinopharm is only 11.5% and China is trying to hide it. This figure was interpreted incorrectly because it was intermediate, the official final result of clinical trials was not ready at the time of publication of the news.
3. The two RFA Chinese sites have rarely reported on the suspected adverse events linked to the main Western-manufactured Covid-19 vaccines (such as Johnson & Johnson vaccine and the scandal around it)but however, 31 Chinese-language stories were spreaded and accused Chinese vaccines, including stories about individual cases of adverse effects, or about hesitancy or objection toward taking the vaccines.
4. Also an article was published blaming the Chinese vaccine for the outbreak of morbidity and hospitalization in Hong Kong, although local officials said there was no direct causal link between vaccination and hospitalization.

ACTION:
The fight against disinformation is one of the main problems of the media at the present time, especially when its publication is associated with political reasons (the confrontation between the United States and China in this case). However, this case is especially dangerous, because it is directly related to the lives and health of tens of thousands of people who died from coronavirus due to distrust of vaccinations.
Yes, the censorship of the Communist Party of China also causes distrust, so when choosing between two evils, people don't know what to believe. The way to solve this problem is to increase the level of trust in the official state media, which have to publish the most truthful information about the vaccine and its side effects, and to provide the general public with official transparent results of medical studies of vaccines of Chinese origin.  As for independent media, the task of such a journalists is to be as objective as possible and let the reader form an opinion himself, and not to propagandize his point of view and scare.

Maria Iurchuk

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Issues:

Governments of many countries give benefits for vaccinated people and restrict antivaxxers. This looks suspicious for adepts of conspiracy theories. They have a point that this is attack on freedom. Another problem is that misinformation creators start use medical report in hyperbolized manner. They exaggerate some problems and bring coincidences like patterns

Evidence:

In Britain, after developing of variant Delta, some vaccinated people died. Enemies of vaccine started to point on that this problem started after vaccine. Another evidence is story with Pfizer and myocarditis. Medical reports say that Pfizer and Moderna have a little bit more occasions of myocarditis than it was thinking. This news was started using by antivaxxers like a proof of inefficiency of these vaccines. Moreover, misinformation harmed women too. The news about that 4000 women had problems with menstruation, but this was drop out from the context.

Actions:

1.    Using a range of tools and methods to analyze online conversations, search trends and networked communities.

2.    Using an evolving database of keywords and Boolean search queries, as well as lists of accounts and communities for investigating research.

3.    Using different social media platforms and a range of social listening technologies including CrowdTangle, NewsWhip Spike and Trendolizer. They are useful for a relative reach and engagement of individual posts as well as overall narratives.

4.    Use English for the researches as many articles and information are in this language.

by Egor Kuzovchikov, Anastasia Goryacheva, Anna Michaylova, Alexander Svyatrin

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Misinformation about origins of Covid-10

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Misinformation about origins of Covid-10

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Issue:

The unproven lab-leak theory that the SARS-CoV-2 virus might have originated from a Wuhan lab (China’s Wuhan Institute of Virology) have crept back into the headlines.

Evidence:

Donald Trump, without evidence, has claimed that Covid-19 was engineered in a Wuhan lab.

According to businessinsider.com, in 2020 about 40% of all adult Mexicans and about 23% of all adult Americans believed that Covid-19 was made in a lab.

Action:

In 2020, when people were the most worried about Covid-19 and therefore willing to trust unreliable sourses, Facebook and other social media platforms removed any assertion that Covid was man-made.

Made by Kseniya Khlopkova.

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Issue: the misleading and spreading conspiracy theories that only Muslims in India are to blame for the spread of Covid-19.

Evidences:

The publication of inflammatory statements about the Jamaat Tabligh, which is a Muslim community whose meeting was shortly before the restrictions on mass events in India in 2020.

the work of YouTube algorithms that lead viewers from videos about Jamaat Tabligh to videos with anti-Muslim sentiments

nationalist and anti-Muslim comments under YouTube videos inciting violence against Muslims

Actions:

YouTube has redoubled its efforts to remove harmful content

Every year, YouTube works to reduce recommendations of content deemed borderline or carrying misinformation

The work was done by Amina Akhmineeva, Margarita Kolpakova, Elizaveta Testova

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issue:
a misleading conspiracy theory on Muslim ban in India linked to the raising case of Covid-19

evidence:
1. before the lockdown was introduced in India, a Muslim missionary group--Tablighi Jamaat in New Delhi.
2. with the algorithm in youtube which is the most used app in India the islamophobia campaign raised easily to the surface. For example, the videos uploaded to youtube promoting the ban such as how a video by national Hindi news outlet being titled: Such Tablighi Jamaat Members Should Be Shot Dead: Raj Thackeray that led to islamophobia in India that would quickly escalate the campaign to the public supported by recommended videos by Youtube because of its algorithm such as Tarek Fatah's video who's a Pakistani-Canadian journalist that previously shared misinformation about Muslims.
3. Hashtags existing on youtube referring to the anti-muslim such as #Corona_Jihad or #BanTablighiJamat that's clearly targetting the Muslims in India, followed by the comments in the videos posted that adds more misleading information and possible propaganda.

action:
1. Google had to make an effort to improve modern practices, specifically to harmful and sensitive issues and YouTube had to redouble its efforts to remove harmful content and expanded its policies around hatred and harassment to reduce content that targets specific groups through conspiracy theories.
2. government should also be more sensitive with this type of case since it targets a specific group, they should've done more investigation into this.
3. governments and local journalists should be fairer in distributing news because news shouldn't be one-sided. they have to look deeper into the case before publishing it to the public.
4. as public, we also have to be more careful with what we read and do deeper research since this is misleading news we might as well took a part in standing with them since the news is most likely one-sided.

Angelica Wulansari

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Issue: misinformation about vaccine from Covid-19 is still wide-spread on Facebook and attracts big amount of people and their positive reactions to such deceptive news. These ridiculous attempts to delude people’s minds do result in more and more misleading information about how vaccines influence our physical and mental health.

Evidence: according to the article, it was found that there were at least 3,200 posts, attracting 142,049 likes, shares and comments, that had been posted on the platform after the ban.

Actions:

Facebook and What’s App cooperate with WHO and distribute verified information about  vaccine in different languages. Therefore millions of people receive trustworthy data about coronavirus.

A special ChatBot was created within social networks that supply people with all essential and verified information.

In certain countries it has been made illegal to post misinformation about coronavirus on social networks, otherwise a person will receive a fine or will be banned. The rules are getting more and strict.

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How anti-Muslim content spreads on YouTube in India

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How anti-Muslim content spreads on YouTube in India

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Issue: the misleading and spreading conspiracy theories that only Muslims in India are to blame for the spread of Covid-19.

Evidences:

The publication of inflammatory statements about the Jamaat Tabligh, which is a Muslim community whose meeting was shortly before the restrictions on mass events in India in 2020.

The work of YouTube algorithms that lead viewers from videos about Jammat Tabligh to videos with anti-Muslim sentiments

Nationalist and anti-Muslim comments under YouTube videos inciting violence against Muslims

Actions:

YouTube has redoubled its efforts to remove harmful content

Every year, YouTube works to reduce recommendations of content deemed borderline or carrying misinformation

By Amina Akhmineeva, Margarita Kolpakova and Elizaveta Testova

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Issue: Modern journalist can easily end up in danger in the world, where there is a lack of physical and digital safety. Journalism is a risky and challenging profession, as these people are vulnerable to different kinds of violence, restrictions, pressure and threatening.

Evidence: Journalists are typically on the frontline when crises hit, bearing witness to historical events, be it the collapse of a regime or the unfolding of a once-a-century pandemic. And some events have taught us that journalists who cover online misinformation can be exposed to real-life security risks. According to The Guardian, 42 journalists and media workers have been killed while doing their jobs in 2020, according to the International Federation of Journalists’ annual tally. A further 235 are in prison in cases related to their work, the report showed.

Action: Article provides 10 useful tips for professional journalists to protect themselves in critical situations:

1) Assess personal safety: keep your eye on surroundings and people around, check whether they are suspiciously interested in your work. Cover your webcam and microphone and if available, apply a privacy screen protector. Keep your organization updated with your whereabouts and contact methods.

2) Stay connected with external contacts: contact your families, friends and colleagues outside the country, keep them updated about your situation and provide them with your online and offline contact methods.

3) Cover your digital tracks
Download browser extensions such as "HTTPS Everywhere" that automatically switch websites from insecure “HTTP” to secure “HTTPS” and protect against account hijacking and surveillance.

4) Secure email provider: anyone can see what’s on your screen with relative ease if you use a free wireless network and an unsecured email provider.

5) Self-destructing messaging app with end-to-end encryption choose a messaging app with end-to-end encryption for your text messages, group chats, data transfers and voice calls, and ideally one that allows you to automatically erase, or “self-destruct” your messages, such as Signal.

6) Lock social media accounts: in a crisis, you would better deactivate all your social media accounts and memorize your passwords; delete the accounts if necessary.

7) Passwords, two-factor authentication: generate complex passwords using password managers like LastPass and Dashlane, and store them in their encrypted database.

8) Separate browsers and social accounts for work and personal use
Use unrelated, complex passwords on both browsers, and keep your work accounts strictly professional to protect your privacy.

9) Social media scrubbing: scrub your social media accounts with apps like Jumble and Scrubber that can detect and delete old posts based on various filters (e.g. religious and political content)

10) Editorial policy: work with your organization to outline the physical and digital security protocols for your team. Always blur the name, user ID and profile photo of a social media user before publishing screenshots of social posts.

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Spreading climate change denialism among imageboard users

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Spreading climate change denialism among imageboard users

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Issue:

There is clearly a tendency among imageboard (4chan, 8kun) users not to trust official statistics and reports, refer to unverified sources and spread conspiracy theories mostly by sharing YouTube and BitChute video links.

Evidence:
Carlotta Dotto's investigation, using URL analysis, showed more than 2,000 posts united by the theme of distrust about the existence of global warming or the influence of people on the climate

Action:
United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres said that 2021 will be a “crucial year for action on climate change.”

A separate UN survey showed broad global support for more action being taken to address this “global emergency.”

Unreliable content is marked with the appropriate identification mark on many platforms (for example Twitter)

Kostylev Maximilian

p.s. well, the original document looks a little prettier i swear. i suppose the site dithers images for servers storage economy

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Issue:

There are more and more claims about the dangers of the Chinese vaccine in the information space . The result of this phenomenon is hesitancy regarding the use of the Sinovac and the spread of misinformation about the remedy against  coronavirus.

Evidence:

Originally, misleading narratives about Chinese vaccine apperad in the RFA websites (Radio Free Asia) , and then fake news about the consequences of the vaccine   became common .  However , The Hong Kong administration expressed dissatisfaction with the spread of criticism and fakes regarding the Chinese Sinovac vaccine. According to officials, attempts at sabotage are only worthy of condemnation. Earlier, the media began to receive information that a 63-year-old resident of Hong Kong died after vaccination. Further, the "chain of deaths from the vaccine" continued, and six more people became "victims of the vaccine". All cases were actively discussed in the media, in particular, there were suggestions that Sinovac causes some dangerous side effects, since all the victims received this particular vaccine.

"I would like to condemn the small number of people who are trying to sabotage our efforts [on vaccination]. They spread fake news, misinformation, rumors through social networks, the media, in other ways,"

said Carrie Lam, the head of the Hong Kong administration. Government experts have previously clarified that there is no link between deaths and vaccines.

Actions :

It is necessary to fight against the false facts about Sinovac vaccine. Most of the deception derives from the RFA websites , that is why it will be effectively to make citizens from different states pay attention to reliable sources and truthful sites  to avoid misinformation. Additionally, people should be provided with scientific facts about chinese vaccine .  Indeed, Indonesian state-owned pharmaceutical company Bio Farma reported that interim data on trials of the Chinese Sinovac vaccine demonstrated its effectiveness at up to 97%. Another point is dissemination of information about the presence of a false source . This action will help to influence on Radio Free Asia and prevent further misinformation.

Participants: Nastya Korotunenko, Polina Lukina

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issue- the idea that Covid-19 vaccines are experimental and dangerous has been one of the stickiest narratives on social media since the rollout of the vaccines in December 2020.

evidence- part of the problem is the novel mRNA-based technology used in the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines, which spurred a wave of misinformation and conspiracy theories as well as skepticism about Covid-19 vaccines more generally. But another reason for the narrative’s popularity is its versatility. It is often used in conjunction with other well-established narratives claiming that vaccines are harmful or that we are guinea pigs in an immoral mass experiment.

Many right-wing personalities and organizations as well as conspiracy theory-related Pages and accounts have capitalized on the “experimental” rhetoric to stoke fears around “totalitarian” vaccination policies and reframe Covid-19 vaccines as an issue related to civil liberties and individual freedom.
As Covid-19 cases climb and new variants emerge, policymakers are set to explore new ways to encourage vaccine uptake. Right-wing personalities and organizations on social media, with the help of coordinated disinformation networks, are likely to continue to respond with the “experimental” narrative to frame the vaccine debate along the lines of personal freedoms and further politicize the issue.

action-1) United States Surgeon General Vivek Murthy said that misinformation has led people to reject vaccines and public health advice on masks and social distancing, undermining efforts to end the coronavirus pandemic and putting lives at risk.
US Surgeon General Vivek Murthy on Thursday called for a national effort to fight misinformation about COVID-19 and vaccines, urging tech companies, health care workers, journalists and everyday Americans to do more to address a problem “that cost us lives”.

In a 22-page advisory, his first as President Joe Biden’s surgeon general, Murthy wrote that bogus claims have led people to reject vaccines and public health advice on masks and social distancing, undermining efforts to end the coronavirus pandemic and putting lives at risk.

2) Federation of State Medical Boards issued a statement making clear that doctors who generate and spread COVID-19 misinformation could be subject to disciplinary action, including having their licenses suspended or revoked. The American Board of Family Medicine, American Board of Internal Medicine and American Board of Pediatrics issued a joint statement of support Sept. 9, warning that “such unethical or unprofessional conduct may prompt their respective Board to take action that could put their certification at risk.”

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Misleading narratives about Chinese vaccines

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Misleading narratives about Chinese vaccines

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Issue: There are cases when China’s Covid-19 vaccines are discussed in misleading ways around the world, which could undermine confidence in them. Skepticism about vaccines from China could impede global health officials’ effort to use the shots to fill gaps in the global vaccine supply.
Some articles lacked key context in describing purported issues with Chinese-made vaccines. This could enable the spread of anti-vaccine misinformation at a time when research suggests that exposure to online misinformation about vaccines can increase rates of vaccine hesitancy.

Evidence: Some of the misleading narratives about China’s vaccines appear on the Mandarin- and Cantonese-language websites of Radio Free Asia (RFA), a news outlet funded by the US government.

A First Draft review of coverage of vaccines on the sites found a number of questionable narratives about China’s vaccines — particularly the Sinopharm shot as well as Sinovac (also known as Coronavac).

In one example, a November 10 article on RFA’s Cantonese website, headlined “Clinical trial of Chinese vaccine halted in Brazil after causing serious incident,” lacked important context from local authorities. A serious incident had indeed occurred: the death of a participant in a local trial of the Sinovac vaccine. But Reuters reported November 9 that the death had been deemed a suicide and that an official had denied any link to the vaccine, a detail not noted in RFA’s article.

In their overall coverage of vaccines, the two RFA Chinese sites have in recent months rarely reported on the suspected adverse events linked to the main Western-manufactured Covid-19 vaccines. The sites did not cover the temporary suspension of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine in the US and Europe because of a rare type of blood-clotting disorder in a small number of recipients.

On top of several articles that lacked context and were potentially misleading, most of the sites’ recent vaccines coverage overall focuses on the Chinese-made vaccines, and was predominantly negative.

Launched in 1996, RFA publishes in English and nine other languages spoken in Asia. Its reporting on human rights violations in Myanmar, China’s Xinjiang region and elsewhere has received praise and awards. Some of its journalists face harassment, assault and even imprisonment in the countries where they work.

Actions: Misleading narratives about Chinese vaccines are spread mostly by Radio Free Asia (RFA), a news outlet funded by US government. Therefore, in order to stop spreading disinformation, we should influence US agenda about this issue.

We should raise awareness about the problem to fight against false information about the effectiveness of the vaccines. Discussion of this issue in independent media from different countries can draw public attention to the problem and It can influence agenda of the news outlets such as RFA.

RFA’s two Chinese sites have a combined following of over 1.4 million on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. Many social media and websites have a special system of searching information about COVID-19, which helps them to provide users with authoritative results from health organizations.

by Ekaterina Churkina and Daria Boldanova

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Issue: That misinformation is being circulated on the video-sharing platform YouTube regarding the causes of the coronavirus pandemic in that it is supposedly caused by the Indian Muslim community, which resulted in the outbreak of violence against the Mohammedans in the country. And the response to such attacks on India’s secular modern democracy is pathetic to say the least.

Evidence: As provided in the article here, https://firstdraftnews.org/articles/tablighi-jamaat-blamed-for-covid-19-spread-on-india-youtube/ , YouTube recommendations have been infiltrated by these miscreants, and the posting of malicious content by certain till-recently relatively “good” media outlets.

Action: To further strengthen government efforts to promote the scientific discussion of the coronavirus pandemic, to find the criminals promoting discord between communities, and to hand them over into the hands of the law.
It is also equally important to not see this as Islamophobia in that sense of the word, but rather as the expected work of useless, worthless idiots lingering in Indian society.
Government efforts need to be seriously reconsidered especially with regard to its dealings with social platforms, as the response needs reverberate right from the content creator and publisher to the end consumer and everyone in between.

Santoshchandra Chitrapu

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Overlays: How journalists can avoid amplifying misinformation in their stories

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Overlays: How journalists can avoid amplifying misinformation in their stories

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Issue: Disinformation is quite widespread in the modern world. It allows you to increase the readership and citation by using catchy headlines or completely fabricated stories. But at the same time, the practice of exposing fake news with the help of illustrative examples of disinformation is quite widespread. This practice also has a negative side of the coin, when your evidence of misinformation can cause harm, reinforcing it.

Evidence: Firstly, the misinformation you are talking about can reproduce its messages and emotions for your readers, possibly delivering it to more people than the original post. Secondly, visual effects, for example, the image that you are using, can be copied or taken a screenshot and used for malicious purposes by redistributing it.

Actions: Use new tools to move visual media in a safe way.  Overlays are among these tools.  Overlays is a visual filter placed over an image containing misinformation.

Seven principles of creating Overlays:

1. watermark so the warning travels with the image

2. Protect against forgery (for example, finding ways to add bespoke illustrations and marks that are not acceptable to would-be forgers)

3. Make sure the warning is noticeable

4. Avoid judgmental tone

5. Provide context - about the misinformation and the overlay

6. Make sure it meets accessibility standards

7. Provide a way for people to verify the overlay

by Suslova Ekaterina

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Разноцветный Жирный Современный Чирлидинг Плакат

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Overlays: How journalists can avoid amplifying misinformation in their stories. Влада Васильева, Юрий Сибилев, Дарья Башмакова

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Overlays: How journalists can avoid amplifying misinformation in their stories. Влада Васильева, Юрий Сибилев, Дарья Башмакова

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Issue: Including images of misinformation can cause harm by amplifying it.

Evidence: the misinformation that feature in a story can reproduce its messages and emotion for readers, perhaps bringing it to more people than the original post. Given that many bad actors are seeking coverage, this can further their aims. And the image used in your story can be copied or screengrabbed and reused in other contexts, possibly with bad intentions.

Actions: Overlays are the tools we can ensure visual media travels in secure ways.
Applying an overlay to images of misinformation helps us provide context to readers. It prevents us further amplifying harmful content simply by reproducing the original, and stops readers from reusing it in other contexts.
Overlays can also help with two other important considerations for journalists: reducing the distress of graphic imagery and protecting individuals’ identities.
Principles for designing overlays:
1. Watermark so the warning travels with the image
2. Protect against forgery
3. Make sure the warning is noticeable
4. Avoid judgmental tone
5. Provide context — about the misinformation and the overlay
6. Make sure it meets accessibility standards
7. Provide a way for people to verify the overlay

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 COVID-19: disinformation from media resources 

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 COVID-19: disinformation from media resources 

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Issues: Fake news about coronavirus are popular in the media space. Some sources claim that a pandemic is not real, while others deny the benefits of vaccines or lie about the statistics. In a panic, people believe everything they see and read, but this information is not always provided by reliable sources.

Evidence: In the spring of 2020, many publics on the Russian social network spread false statistics of the disease in order to gain popularity. According to official data, about 800,000 fake news was deleted by the VK administration irrevocably.

Action: VK created a special section with information about the current state of the epidemic, the number of cases infected in Russia. All information from this service provided by verified sources (WHO, the Russian Ministry of Health and other agencies)

VK also do the following :

blocking users and city bots that send mass mailings:

monitoring fake news:

restricting access for people distributing such news.

disseminating verified information about statistics and facts.

by Anna Ivanova, Xenia Ivanova, Alina Minzhulina, Ksenia Grishkova, Zlata Nikiforova.

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The crucial problem that we are going to discuss is the spread of misinformation about global warming in the Internet.

There are a lot of evidence which confirm the existance of the problem.
The first one is the distribution of fake hashtags due to the absence of warning labels in social networks.
Another evidence is the emergence of misleading climate change mems and the rapid growth of their popularity.
Finally, the spread of the theory that the problem of global warming is just "a plot to control the world's population" also proves that the issue exists.

To solve the problem we would like to provide you with some actions.
To start with, it is necessary to increase the control under the detection of misleading text-based content.
Besides, the distribution of verified and trustworthy information about global warming may be useful to overcome the problem.
It is also meaningful to encourage people to complain about misinformation in social networks.

Participants: Angelina Volodinskaya, Elizaveta Naumova

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Overlays: How journalists can avoid amplifying misinformation in their stories

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Overlays: How journalists can avoid amplifying misinformation in their stories

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ISSUE:

Technical ability for journalists to report on misinformation in the news in audio and video format, while:
a) Leave the story engaging, memorable and informative;
b) Avoid spreading misinformation or using the information for malicious purposes.

EVIDENCE:

1) We use the term overlays to refer to a visual filter placed over an image that contains misinformation. Overlays are a tool for journalists to prevent amplification.

2) It prevents us further amplifying harmful content simply by reproducing the original, and stops readers from reusing it in other contexts.

3) Reducing the distress of graphic imagery and protecting individuals’ identities. This is best achieved by blurring relevant parts of the image.

4) Ways to add bespoke illustrations and marks that are not accessible to would-be forgers, rather than generic iconography such as “false” stamps.

ACTIONS:

The group of journalists from "First draft" created the guidance about prudent using of overlays in order to demonstrate to journalists how to avoid amplifying misinformation in their stories.

Journalists should follow 7 steps:

1. Find a way to watermark the entire image.

2. Use complex patterns, custom-made signs that are unavailable to potential forgers.

3. Make the warning bright and obvious at first glance.

4. Avoid judgmental tone. Use exclamation marks (not crosses) and neutral colours.

5. Include information on who applied the overlay, when it was applied, and a short statement about its purpose.

6. Estimate legibility and readability of the overlay. Design it clear for everyone.

7. Provide a way for people to verify the overlay.

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HIV misinformation, ignorance and stigma

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HIV misinformation, ignorance and stigma

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Issue: A huge number of people infected with HIV face total ignorance of people and authorities about their problem, social stigma, segregation, and misinformation in the media.

Evidence:  Despite the importance of HIV, there is no adequate coverage of the issue, the media and officials try to avoid the topic, very rarely mention statistics, and spread misinformation, which leads to social stigma and misunderstanding of the population.

Actions:

1)     Political:

a)     Encourage state-level financial support for organizations combating the spread of HIV.

b)     finance organizations involved in HIV prevention.

2)     Law: Encourage in law (e.g., through tax incentives or material and media assistance) the activities of organizations and people involved in combating and preventing the spread of HIV.

3)     Civic:

a)     Encourage (including in the media) charitable activities in this area.

b)     Promote the expansion of volunteer programs to combat and prevent HIV.

c)     Involve volunteers.

4)     Technological: Sponsor the development and distribution of HIV remedies and prevention tools to the world's most underdeveloped and vulnerable countries, as well as to developing countries

Made by Vadim Nikiforov

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Misinformation on social media as a method of fighting protests in Russia

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Misinformation on social media as a method of fighting protests in Russia

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Issue

In the past year, much of the disinformation seen in online Russian-language spaces directly or indirectly targeted the Anti-Corruption Foundation (FBK) and its founder, Alexei Navalny.  And a new wave of suspicious online activity has emerged alongside the protest campaign kicked off by Navalny’s return and subsequent arrest.

Young influencers asked to advance anti-opposition talking points on social media

Over the past decade, figures in or affiliated with the Russian government have been known to buy popular Telegram channels, allowing them to target the channel’s followers with  false claims about the opposition.

Also, similar cases emerged on Instagram and TikTok — a platform virtually unknown to most Russian social media users just two years ago that in 2020 became one of the most-downloaded apps in the country. Amid the January protests, Russian TikTokers such as Boris Kantorovich reported being approached with requests to promote negative messages about Navalny and FBK in exchange for payment starting at 1,000 rubles, with higher payments for those with more followers.

On January 17, the day of Navalny’s return from Germany, Instagram users in Russia began seeing certain hashtags and locations flooded with dozens of photos of “human” faces. The faces bore the hallmarks of an artificial intelligence method called a generative adversarial network (GAN), which can create fake faces to substitute for easily traced photos of real people. The accounts with GAN-generated faces crowded out the authentic posts from the Red Square location on Instagram.

Evidence:

Some accounts that appear sympathetic to the protesters are being used in ways that could disrupt them. In one example, Twitter and Instagram accounts posing as Navalny’s mother, Lyudmila Navalnaya, emerged. The Twitter account quickly drew nearly 2,000 followers. But after activists reached out to her son, Oleg Navalny, and confirmed that those accounts did not belong to her, the Twitter page was rebranded as a generic pro-protest account. It was subsequently used to share broad messages of support for the protesters, but also misinformation, namely a tweet claiming a protest was scheduled for January 30. The real protest was the day after.

In a similar case, an account posing as legendary Russian actress Liya Akhedzhakova — known for her sympathy to Russia’s opposition — was also determined to be fake and deleted days after its creation, but not before gathering more than 30,000 followers.

It’s unclear who is behind the imposter accounts. But similar tactics have been employed by Russian and other state-affiliated actors to foment division in US and European politics, in some cases by mixing facts and fabrications.

Action

As for the technological actions:

To prevent the misinformation and disorganization which are provided by fake accounts in social media it is needful to block such accounts as soon as possible - this decision should be based on the technical algorithms. Also if such content is provided by real people (paid bloggers) it is needful to mark such information as unreliable and unproved providing links to the sources where information can be verified and hiding unproved information from readers and watchers.

As for civic actions:

We should enlighten other people how to verify information and provide them with knowledge which information is true and how to prove it.

As for political action:

Prominent politicians and public figures should inform society about fakes and such methods of creation misinformation

By Polina Khristyuk, Polina Ivanova, Kate Pankova and Anastasia Ershova

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How an anti-Muslim influence operation spread on Indian social media

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How an anti-Muslim influence operation spread on Indian social media

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Issue: an anti-Muslim influnce network in India using the conflict in Twitter about anti-islam and pro-Israel messages as a vehicle to promote Isalamophobia. The large percentage of recently created Twitter accounts is highly indicative of a coordinated use of the network.

Evidence: to prove the issue of islamophobia, we can recall these year events, then amid the escalating Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the group of pro-Hindu nationalists started a campaign in social media to spread anti-muslim messages using #UnitedAgainstJehad hashtag. Messages were accompanied by picture with instructions, for example to tweet at least 40 times. By May 13 there were over 11,000 post with hashtag, and by May 17 about 40,000 tweets posted by almost 6000 accounts. In their posts, they used alternative spellings and some kind of “aesopian language” in order to avoid moderation

The idea of these people was to push anti-muslim messages in India and world, as they think that Islam threats to their culture, way of life and national security. Data analysis shows that 20% of accounts spreading such messages, were created between march and may, so they likely were created in coordination, specially for spreading such messages.

Also, many of these tweets has references to “love jihad”, an islamophobic conspiracy theory created by Hindu nationalists which states that muslims target Indian women to convert them into islam, so to demographically replace Hindu people. These conspiracy exist for more than 10 years and highly influence public life in India, for example it contributed to success in elections of BJP, a right-wing nationalist party of India.

Action:

so, how to combat the Islamophobia?

1. The first and foremost, Twitter should ban the hashtags #IndiaStandsWithIsrael and #IndiaStandsWithPalestine, and the most dangerous one - #UnitedAgainstJehad.

2. People who actually care about the situation should be social responsible. The twitters users have to report on islamophobic tweets in order to ban inciting hatred accounts and to prevent the spread of negative attitude of muslims.

3. Indians have to start educational campaigns about the muslims and speak about  the true information about the situation.

Glazkova Yana, Lemeshko Valentina, Shityakova Victoria, Mamporia Danil

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Islamophobia must not be allowed in India!-2_page-0001

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made by Alexander Konkin and Tatiana Krasnolobova

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How to stop misinformation related to the US vaccine database

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How to stop misinformation related to the US vaccine database

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issue: international spread of mis- and disinformation about Covid-19 vaccines based on the VAERS database

evidence: «Mis- and disinformation about Covid-19 vaccines based on the VAERS database has traveled internationally. First Draft researchers have recorded false narratives citing VAERS reports on just about every platform, including mainstream social media such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and TikTok, fringe messaging apps such as Telegram and video platforms including YouTube and BitChute. Problematic claims about Covid-19 vaccines leaning on VAERS’ credibility have also been published in online articles and broadcast on television. Broadly, VAERS reports and data are often used in mis- and disinformation narratives to falsely assert or suggest that deaths, injuries or illnesses were caused by Covid-19 vaccines. However, as explained by the CDC and FDA, reports of adverse events following immunization with US-licensed vaccines can be made by anyone and may include incomplete, inaccurate, unverified or coincidental information. The highlighting of VAERS reports that could evoke strong emotional responses is a common tactic to stoke fears around vaccines, particularly with reports that detail a person’s injury or death and those that relate to children»

actions:

· Political - legislative control over spread of misinformation

· Civic - self-checking of sources that publish data - self-education about COVID-19 situation

· Technological

- increasing the security level of the VAERS resource

- control over the quantity and quality of VAERS data distribution

- specifying links to the source

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Improperly covered falsehoods, conspiracy theories and white supremacy lead people to the "whole new worlds" of distortion

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Improperly covered falsehoods, conspiracy theories and white supremacy lead people to the "whole new worlds" of distortion

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Issue:
While covering such vulnerable issues as white supremacy, falsehoods or conspiracy theories, journalists face big challenges. With no incentives, journalists can spread false information to entirely new audiences, normalize dangerous messages and incentivize future harms.

Storytelling in the news media and storytelling in entertainment media are different, of course; the purpose of the news media is to inform, while the purpose of entertainment media is to entertain. The directive to inform the public gives journalists enormous power. The central to entertainment media are large audience reach, material simplification so to easier perception. Movie business recently set out to be more as a carries for new stereotypes of behavior and social practices. Is this a manifestation of tolerance, belated repentance, or, distortion of historicism?

Evidence:
1) There is the alliance between Hollywood and Penthagon covered in journals. The latter got involved in movies as "X-man", "Jurassic Park 3", "Transormers". Hence, all movies are so-called pro-American, claiming the nation as the prevailing, best, irresistible; they stigmatise historical enemies of the US (Russia, Great Britain for example) to be in infinite conflict throughout movies thus convincing the audience to absorb pro-American vision of modern world relationships. The US Department of Defense has "...only in insidious jingoism that manipulates public opinion to their favor. "
2) The Oscar-ceremony has also undergone tremendous changes. Now to apply to the notion of the "Best Picture", the film should consist of the third of women, people with disabilities and LGBT representatives. What's more, at least one of the leading roles should be portrayed by an actor of Asian, Latin or African-American origin. Yuri Bykov, Russian prominent director and script-writer, proposed the following as a response to oscar amendments: "I believe that this is an absolutely archaic, retrograde approach under the guise of liberality, to liberality as such, to its essence, which has nothing to do."
The aforesaid implies only the re-adressing of the problem of sexual minorities, women rights, war withstanding, white supremacy, harassment upon unlike people and their groups. But such approach doesn't help. Public is already aware of harms being exposed, so I suggest the actions to deal with inaccurate media coverages.

Actions:
Pay attention to the causes of actions - the most profitable is to point a camera at the most obvious. The broader context is what makes such actions possible. Then, give equal space to characters who harm, who do good and who suffer from the harm caused - trying to provoke shock by covering only one of those agents is insufficient. Such stories will only implicitly suggest that calling into attention will help to solve the problem. Lastly, make sure you are not speaking plainly about the community and the harms and risks that are undertaken there. Again, your incentive to adress the problem one more time will do no good to its solution.

The outcomes can't be fully controlled. However, some varieties may be introduced for those who are balancing between two extremes of rejection and utility.

by Anna Sergeeva

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A guide to prebunking: a promising way to inoculate against misinformation.

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A guide to prebunking: a promising way to inoculate against misinformation.

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Issue: There is a large amount of misinformation on the Internet that misleads people. People don't know how to distinguish false information from true information. A way to combat disinformation is needed. And the best way is to prevent misinformation, not cure.

Evidence: Studies show that misinformation affects our thinking faster and more, and disproof of this information work worse because misinformation is hard to get out of our heads. That's why prevention, not cure, is better. For example, five minutes of playing the game "Go Viral!" can reduce susceptibility to misinformation for up to three months.

Action: All in all, we must deal with misinformation. As prevention is better than cure then we should know how to prebunk misleading knowledge. There are some recommendations to follow. To start with, one needs to know what is to be prebunked. Secondly, one needs to prepare truthful information that should be presented in an understandable and available way. Finally, one should realize and know how and where to share his prebunkment. Such small and simple tips can be very useful for anyone who wants to combat misinformation.

Made by: Temnova Aleksandra, Ivanova Xenia, Andrey Maikov

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News of Muslim discrimination in India spread widely and was reported by a well-known TV channel on Youtube.

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Sadistic False Claims about Muslims in India

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Sadistic False Claims about Muslims in India

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Issue : Islamophobia in India is very troubling. They create misleading and sadistic content about Muslims. The content is widespread and many people are watching the video so that it becomes a recommended video on the Youtube channel. Worse yet, there is a famous television station reporting this. The people who watched the video became instigated and manipulated. This discrimination makes Muslims in India feel afraid and depressed because they are oppressed by irresponsible people.

Evidence : Two mainstream Indian news channels with many subscribers spread misleading and inflammatory claims about Tablighi Jamaat and Covid-19. The two news channels are ABC News and Zee News. Zee News made news regarding the speculation of Tablighi Jamaat's 'betrayal' to the country. Then ABC News also reported that Muslims in India were the cause of the coronavirus. The news was so viral, at least five news stories from 52 recommended videos of the news segment used language or spread information that demonized Muslims. The news greatly led to public opinion so that many comments insulted Muslims.

Action : Youtube is working with Google to tackle content that spreads misleading information and hate by improving several policies to reduce the content. Moreover, the Trust and Safety teams have been expanded to 20,000 to enforce policies and moderate content in multiple languages. Since India is the largest contributor to videos on Youtube, moderation of Indian language videos is the first priority. Youtube and Google have invested in automated systems and machine learning capabilities.

by Chintya Dasbhara

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Overlays: How journalist can avoid amplifying misinformation in their stories

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Overlays: How journalist can avoid amplifying misinformation in their stories

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Issue:

It is quite widely spread practice to publish different visual examples of misinformation. On the one hand, it seems an extremely engaging way of distribution facts that can be considered as your evidence of misinformation, on the other hand, such an approach could help in spreading the fake news on the Internet. Also, some people can use your publication for evil purposes and, in this case, your visual evidence of misinformation could lead to bad consciousness.
When a person publishes an article, a post, or even a note in their social networks using a screenshot of misinformation, for instance, he/she at the same time helps in spreading and amplifying it.

Evidence:

Before the elections in Russia in 2021, all the parties that were going to fight for getting into parliament released election videos. There were several scandals on this topic. For example, an unknown source published an election video on behalf of the LDPR where were some scenes with LGBT ideas. Although the LDPR denies the fact that such a video was published by them, a lot of people and TV programs spoke on this event, showing the video as an official and not-faked one.

Actions:

The creation of overlays that will help people identify fake information. In order to make as many people as possible awared of the fakes an overlay should be qualitative and hard to remove. There are some recommendations one should follow to make a really good overlay.
1) Make a watermark that will cover as much information as possible. This way it will be more difficult to crop and use information in an inappropriate way.
2) When creating an overlay avoid colors and backgrounds that are easy to forge. Instead use intricate patterns, texture and gradients. Thus, the number of forgeries will be reduced and it will be easier to identify edits as they will become more visible.
3) Make a warning more noticeable and catchy than misinformation because what people see first really influences what they will trust more.
4) Do not use judgmental tone when making an overlay. This way people won’t feel ashamed and it will be easier for them to accept they were wrong by trusting an unreliable source. Moreover, if there is no judgmental tone, people won’t be ashamed to warn others about misinformation.
5) Include important information(organization’s name, the date of creation and an explanation that the overlay was added to an original image; who applied the overlay, when it was applied, what the overlay is and a short statement about its purpose, with a link to more information(URL)) to avoid cherry-picking and misunderstandings. Furthermore, such data will make an overlay more reliable to people as they can check everything they need to know.
6) Assess an overlay for color contrast, legibility and readability and make the necessary adjustments. Thus, a warning will be more accessible and more people will pay real attention and give importance to it which is crucial.

By Arseniy Karsakov, Anna Lyakhova, Violetta Churikova.

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Красный и Оттенки серого Фотография Антивоенный Плакат (1)

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How fringe candidates use misinformation to gain outsized online influence

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How fringe candidates use misinformation to gain outsized online influence

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Issue: Their misleading, attention-grabbing campaign videos are viewed by thousands — sometimes hundreds of thousands — of voters. But just how much influence falsehood-posting fringe candidates have online is often skewed.
Candidates sometimes used misinformation to gain status online, tapping into conspiracy theory communities and challenging the existence of Covid-19 and the safety of vaccines. Their Facebook and Twitter followings vastly exceed their offline support.

Evidence:
Many Londoners are accustomed to seeing the face of Brian Rose plastered on highway billboards and “Brian For Mayor” leaflets delivered through their mailboxes, but his brand was largely built online. The former banker utilized the pandemic to grow his YouTube channel London Real, which regularly promotes misinformation and conspiracy theories. Through spectacle and shock, he’s attracted much recent media attention, including a video in which he drinks his own urine.

In 2020, Rose crowdfunded nearly £1 million for a "Digital Freedom Platform" a video-hosting space exclusively for conspiracy theory videos, such as the viral “Plandemic” film, which was banned by Facebook and YouTube. One of the top most interacted-with Facebook posts containing a link to the “Digital Freedom Platform” promoted “Plandemic,” attracting more than 2,400 shares. Facebook has labeled the post as “partly false information.”

Moreover, lesser-known fringe candidates are also benefiting from amplification while promoting misleading pandemic content. David Kurten, a London Assembly member running as the Heritage Party candidate, saw his Twitter follower count rise from 27,700 to 68,900 over the last year, as he consistently promoted conspiracy theories that mRNA vaccines are “rushed,”  “experimental” and made from aborted fetuses. As part of his mayoral campaign, he was a vocal critic of so-called “vaccine passports” and frequently voiced his opposition to Covid-19 testing, masks and vaccines in Twitter posts with thousands of likes and retweets.

Actions:
1) Careful reporting about those candidates who spread the misinformation.
Social media should notify their audience about unreliable candidates which use fakes to gain political profits and provide them with educational podcasts.
2) Reporting responsibility and obligation to verification.
There should be legal punishment (for instance, fines) for those who intentionally distribute misinformation.

3) Simplify an opportunity for users to complain about fake news in social networks.
Security staff of social networks should check suspicious accounts or channels which have a significant number of reports  from users (special option "Fake News" should be introduced for such cases)

4) Mandatory disclaimer on the account in social networks of a person who regularly distributes fakes
After three posts which were proved to be fakes, there should be a special mark that this account provide followers with disinformation.

Semichev Dmitrii, Sovchik Eugene

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Climate change conspiracy memes on Instagram extend across the web

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Climate change conspiracy memes on Instagram extend across the web

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Issue: Many of the most popular posts denied the existence of climate change, challenged the idea that it is caused by humans, claimed the world was entering an era of global cooling or that global warming was part of a plot to control the world’s population. Other posts pushed conspiracy theories related to chemtrails (the belief that condensation trails from aircraft are actually airborne chemical or biological agents), the New World Order and the Great Reset, while still more posts hawked misinformation about Covid-19 vaccines.

Evidence: As part of the analysis, researchers also investigated misleading climate change memes and tracked them across the web. These bite-sized images overlaid with text, at times innocuous and playful, can also be powerful tools in the “information warfare” operations of governments and bad actors around the world. They cater to our emotions, “hack” our attention and are easily shareable, making them a persuasive package of misinformation.
Collectively, memes and images accounted for nearly 80% of the posts in our dataset. Researchers filtered specifically for misleading and polarizing climate change posts with memes that were published between January 1 and April 10.

Action: To track the spread of these memes on the web, we should use the “Detect Web entities and pages” feature of the Google Cloud Vision API to reverse image-search the memes. Also, boards and platforms provide stricter policies in the field of publications. Administrations of the platforms are continuing to improve their search results.

The poster is made by Margarita Timofeeva, Kamilla Ismagilova, Tatiana Bannikova

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Covid-19 and vaccine disinformation: Facebook case

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Covid-19 and vaccine disinformation: Facebook case

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Issue: A range of specific, patently false statements about Covid-19 and vaccines  which were posted on Facebook.

Evidence: Facebook is expanding efforts to remove false claims on Facebook about COVID-19 and vaccines during the pandemic. Since December, it has removed false claims about COVID-19 vaccines that have been debunked by public health experts.

Action:  Following consultations with leading health organizations, including the World Health Organization (WHO), it is expanding the list of false claims it will remove to include additional debunked claims about the coronavirus and vaccines. This includes claims such as:

COVID-19 is man-made or manufactured

Vaccines are not effective at preventing the disease they are meant to protect against

It’s safer to get the disease than to get the vaccine

Vaccines are toxic, dangerous or cause autism

Facebook is continuing to improve Search results on platforms. When people search for vaccine or COVID-19 related content on Facebook, it promote relevant, authoritative results and provide third-party resources to connect people to expert information about vaccines.

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Issue :

Hong Kong unlike the rest of mainland China its officially considered as a Special Administrative Region of the People’s Republic of China. Due to its recent handover (1997) from Britain the overall agreement between the two sides was that the PRC would not change the overall autonomy of Hong Kong.

Many of the Hong Kongers still hold a western mind set due to their past. In recent events locals felt threatened by Beijing's oppressive approach (national security act enacted in 2019), thus resulting in a decline of trust in the Chinese government.

Following Covid-19 events many in Hong Kong feel that the Chinese authorities impose their force in order to tackle the pandemic situation by encouraging the use of Chinese made vaccines. Because of the autonomy of Hong Kong, locals are free to choose vaccines made in the west such Pfizer, Moderna, Astrazeneca etc.

Due to what we just described, the vaccination issue became a political matter. Just like any matter that is politicized, people supporting both sides started spreading mis-information to promote their agenda by using social media platforms such Facebook, Twitter, Tik-Tok and what not.

Evidence:

“Despite free vaccination and an abundance of supply, only around 14 percent of the city’s 7.5 million people have received at least one dose as of May 11.”

“According to Britain’s YouGov poll, the percentage of people in Hong Kong who said they would take the vaccine or had already done so between December 13 and May 10 is among the lowest  — around 39 percent — compared with other countries in the APAC region.”

First Draft’s research found that Hong Kong’s previous adoption of strict health measures during the SARS outbreak in 2003 might be a reason for their unexpected hesitancy.

“False claims such as “Carrie Lam did not get the Sinovac shot!” came immediately after the Hong Kong leader and her administration were vaccinated at a public event February 22”

The major correlation between low rates of vaccination and the widespread misinformation on social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter and some local social media platforms.

Actions: In order to propose possible solutions we should first of all: create a consciousness among the people of Hong Kong to separate their political beliefs from their medical choices.

On top of that, we also believe that some algorithms that make this separation automatically and warn the audience about possible misleading information may be put in place.

Marco De Martini, Utku Ozan Ersoy & Franco Ramírez

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Purple and Blue Corporate Clean Safety and Direction General Health Poster

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How to reduce anti-Muslim hatred on Indian social media

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How to reduce anti-Muslim hatred on Indian social media

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Issue: Islamophobia is one of the crucial issues in India today. The conflict between Hindus and Muslims took place in 1947, when they asked for Independence and Muslims called for a separate state. The Indian anti-Muslim uses the conflict between Israel and Palestine to make propaganda against Muslims in their country, using the hashtag #UnitedAgainstJehad to spread misinformation about the people following this religion.

Evidence: Indians has shared on social media lots of tweets under the hashtag #UnitedAgainstJehad including references to the theory “love jihad”, the sexual violence perpetuated by Muslims and cases in which the rejection of the Muslim culture and costume lead a person to be violated, tortured, or killed. The hashtags have been also misspelled intentionally to avoid content moderation. Everything is done to vehiculate a violent, barbaric, and primitive picture of the Muslim world, as well as the fake news about the fact that Muslims were obliging Hindu girls to marry them. Moreover, the Prime Minister, Narendra Modi, signed the Citizenship Amendment Act. It allows Hindu, Sikh, Buddhist, Parsi, Jain and Christian migrants from other country to have faster the citizenship, although it remains unaltered for Muslims.

Action: In order to avoid this discrimination against Muslim, we could follow some steps, undertaken by ODHR (Office of Diversity and Human Rights), including:
1) develop educational policies and programs that help to fight hostility, and prejudice.

2) to collect data about the hate-motivated crimes

3) to provide training on hate crimes for non-government organization

4) to create international forums in which are underlined the ways to identify and avoid this kind of crimes.

Moreover, we should not fight hatred with violence and fight united against every kind of discrimination, trying to explain to people our position, as most of the times the person you stand in front of is only someone who fell in the trap of fake news and misinformation. If anyone sees some discriminatory post, it should immediately report it. We need to support people living in this context of hatred and violence in all the ways possible, either financial or psychological. Social media should control more carefully the content spreading on their platforms, as well as check every kind of misspelled words in order to avoid restrictions.

Zaira Lombardo, Camilla Bersini, Paolo Piccio, Andy Misiuro

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Get the vaccine💉 together💪🏻 ，take away prejudice!👊🏻

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Check out this poster designed by Tsang Chun Wing Tsang.

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YouTube - one of the most famous platforms through which people share different content within videos.

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Misinformation about Muslim on YouTube in India

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Misinformation about Muslim on YouTube in India

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Issue: Muslims were practically accused by Indian's news without real evidence for spreading a coronavirus infection among India for achieving economical purposes. It misled people and it launched a wave of aggression against Muslims groups.

Evidence: According to YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki, India is the company's largest and fastest growing audience. ABC News and Zee News are two major Indian news channels that have published videos about Jamaat Tabligh and Covid-19. YouTube analyzed the recommendations and concluded that after the publication of these news, people switched to watching anti-Muslim videos. Of the 52 recommended videos for viewers of the news segment, at least five used obscene language or disseminated information demonizing Muslims.

Action: Google has begun to combat such misleading content, especially in the list of recommendations on Youtube by increasing to 20,000 trust and security teams. They have also invested in the development of machine learning capabilities, which gives them the opportunity to automatically solve such problems and mark such news with a special tablet "misleading information".

by Polina Mikhailova, Ilya Duev, Karina Baburina

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The Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) -is a publicly accessible database that acts as an “early warning” tool in the US

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How to stop misinformation related to the US vaccine database

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How to stop misinformation related to the US vaccine database

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Issue: A huge disinformative statements about Covid-19 and vaccines posted in different media sourses with the links to the VAERS

Evidance:  Mis- and disinformation about Covid-19 vaccines based on the VAERS database has traveled internationally: false narratives citing VAERS reports have been posted on a lot of platforms, including mainstream social media such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, TikTok, Telegram, YouTube etc. Problematic claims about Covid-19 vaccines leaning on VAERS’ credibility have also been published in online articles and broadcast on television.

These narratives and claims have been shared in multiple languages, such as English and Spanish, and in countries from the US to France to Australia, highlighting their virality and global impact.

Actions: create the ways to decrease the level of misinformation in media and social life

Political:
*VAERS publications

a)      Delay publication of relevant data for the particular period to allow medical experts to assess it.

b)     Do not publish publication online, or create the strong security system.

*Law

a) Knowingly filing a false VAERS report is a federal offense

Civic:

*First Draft

a) Recommendations to journalists

Ensuring VAERS reports are published with overlays or watermarks that provide disclaimers or context

b) Recommendations to the health agencies

Health agencies aware of the misuse of their data could publish prebunks to lessen the effect of common misinformation narratives.

Technological:

*CDC

a) The web-site with answers to common questions and myths about Covid-19 vaccines

b) Prebunks that specifically address misinformation relating to the VAERS database and reports

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Scientists can’t predict the future, but they can help us prevent misinformation

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Scientists can’t predict the future, but they can help us prevent misinformation

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Issue: the flow of misinformation using political, civic and technological actions

Evidence: researching some articles connected with the topic of misinformation

Action: creation of some ways to decrease the level of misinformation in media:
- news literacy
- tools for editors
- questioning financial and power interests of the government
- economical motives of the government

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NAT (National AIDS Trust) is the UK’s leading charity dedicated to transforming society’s response to HIV.

Issue: HIV-related stigma due to misinformation leads to discrimination of HIV-positive people

Evidence: NAT examined 400 online news stories from recent months. 13% of national stories contained misinformation or stigmatising language. And in local news, more than a third (35%) of stories that mentioned HIV transmission gave incorrect information.

Additionally, NAT came across news reports that disclosed the HIV status of individuals, despite it having no relevance to the stories in question.

Action: The creation of new guidelines for journalists, Reporting HIV: how to get it right. The guidlines cover DOs and DON'Ts of HIV reporting, provide detailed information and contacts of NAT's experts.