Disinformation
Two weeks ago in class we had presentations on theories and concepts in communication. The concept that I found interesting was about awareness, specifically disinformation. I found this interesting because it is a huge issue in our world today, especially with news and politics and it also related to theory (confirmation bias) and I thought that I would relate the two.
First, disinformation is false information that is purposely said to mislead consumers. This is a huge issue in news stations and social media because they say things that are current around the world and they want you to believe what they said. This relates to my confirmation bias because they both have to do with fake news. For example, if someone believes something, whether it's true or not, and saw it on the news they would automatically confirm that it is true because the news is reliable so they have no reason not to believe them. The disinformation would confirm their believe regardless if it is true or not.
This is a problem with our world, specifically with the United States, because the news stations want to be the best no matter what they tell their viewers. We also have a problem with differentiating real news and fake news on social media. People will post things just to get noticed and not care if it is reliable or true. So someone will post something online and disinform people with false information and people will confirm their beliefs because they saw and article from an unreliable source.
According to a NYTimes article posted in September of this year, at least 70 countries have had disinformation campaigns. Countries all over the world have had government entities in each of those countries engage in social media manipulation. Facebook also is the number one social media platform for disinformation engagements. This shows that places and people all over the world are feeding in to disinformation and it is getting harder and harder for people to know what news is fake and what is real.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/26/technology/government-disinformation-cyber-troops.html?auth=link-dismiss-google1tap
First, disinformation is false information that is purposely said to mislead consumers. This is a huge issue in news stations and social media because they say things that are current around the world and they want you to believe what they said. This relates to my confirmation bias because they both have to do with fake news. For example, if someone believes something, whether it's true or not, and saw it on the news they would automatically confirm that it is true because the news is reliable so they have no reason not to believe them. The disinformation would confirm their believe regardless if it is true or not.
This is a problem with our world, specifically with the United States, because the news stations want to be the best no matter what they tell their viewers. We also have a problem with differentiating real news and fake news on social media. People will post things just to get noticed and not care if it is reliable or true. So someone will post something online and disinform people with false information and people will confirm their beliefs because they saw and article from an unreliable source.
According to a NYTimes article posted in September of this year, at least 70 countries have had disinformation campaigns. Countries all over the world have had government entities in each of those countries engage in social media manipulation. Facebook also is the number one social media platform for disinformation engagements. This shows that places and people all over the world are feeding in to disinformation and it is getting harder and harder for people to know what news is fake and what is real.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/26/technology/government-disinformation-cyber-troops.html?auth=link-dismiss-google1tap
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