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With the amount of misinformation, disinformation, and flat out lies circulating the internet now, especially related to the Wuhan coronavirus, it is worth considering how you might avoid falling for what looks like seemingly honest, useful or accurate information, but which is actually designed to mislead or confuse you. So how can you tell real news from fake, or a useful public announcement from deliberate misinformation? Jigsaw, owned by Alphabet, the same company that owns Google, is here to help. This is despite ironically being at least partially responsible for a huge amount of false information available online and fed to us as results for every Google search we do... Jigsaw has published an online journal the Current, and also made tools and other information available to journalists and other netizens, in an attempt to educate and assist everyone in preventing the wool from being pulled over our eyes on a daily basis. Despite having a flashy (and yet still not very attractive) website, the Current, does have a whole host of examples, tips, and links that are all worth “diving deeper” into. These range from stories and case studies of where government or other political entities have manipulated internet users by the millions, to doctored images and deep-fake videos that have gone viral. The entirety of this information is no doubt very informative; you just need to take the time to work through it all and make yourself familiar with everything on there. Perhaps it would be useful as course in internet literacy for all netizens to take before they sign up to social media or are allowed to use their phones for the first time? https://jigsaw.google.com/the-current/ |
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