
Disinformation and ‘fake news’: Final Report published - Anon84
https://www.parliament.uk/business/committees/committees-a-z/commons-select/digital-culture-media-and-sport-committee/news/fake-news-report-published-17-19/
======
drawkbox
The truth is the internet is teaching the biggest lesson ever in critical
thinking and getting your information from many sources across spectrums,
countries, divides and more to find out what is really going on.

People must think about why they are hearing about something and the layers
and goals that are behind it and drive it.

Let's hope that people see these disinformation and misinformation efforts as
a lesson and not somewhere they can bask in their confirmation bias all day,
or make decisions based on fear, in those cases the populace is easy to
manipulate, divide and conquer.

When something it too salacious or fits a narrative too perfectly,
someone/group is marketing you in a direction and has you possibly in an
active measure.

~~~
pjc50
I think one of the lessons of the history "accelerate the contradictions" (
[http://acceleratethecontradictions.blogspot.com/2010/04/acce...](http://acceleratethecontradictions.blogspot.com/2010/04/accelerate-
contradictions-notes-towards.html) ) is that putting the public in a situation
where they have to improve lest there be a huge disaster, is a good way to get
a huge disaster.

~~~
dredmorbius
All the children cannot be above average.

~~~
sovietmudkipz
They can if the children of tomorrow are compared with children of yesteryear,
and children’s education system has improved such that children of tomorrow
excel at all the metrics measured.

For example, how much “smarter” are children today than children of 1000 b.c.?

------
BorRagnarok
I think censoring the "fake news" is far more dangerous than to just let it
exist and have people think for themselves about what's true or false.

~~~
stuartaxelowen
Why?

~~~
michaelt
There is a theory that says people will be inoculated against fake news, if
only they're exposed to enough of it. That critical thinking skills, like
immune systems and website security, are made strong by unrelenting attacks.

After all, it's unlikely we'll ever see a day where everyone agrees on
everything so completely that no two humans disagree about anything! And as
long as that's the case, we'd better know how to deal with people telling us
things that are wrong.

The theory goes that seeing social media messages with obvious lies like "Put
nails in your tyres for better winter traction" and "Shoot yourself with small
calibre bullets to build an immunity to larger bullets" teaches people
scepticism and rational thought they can apply to much more complex statements
like "inflation is caused by the fed printing money" and "the highest crime
areas are those with a lot of immigrants"

Does it work? Have we seen it working hitherto? You be the judge!

~~~
pnongrata
Here in Brazil there is a very strong media monopoly, so most people are used
to being fed only one side of the stories. It breaks critical thinking skills
and leaves people completely vulnerable to trash content propagated within
whatsapp and facebook.

The problem here is that these "propagandists" cater to people's emotions in a
very persuasive manner. It's not that it will blatantly tell you "Shoot
yourself with small calibre bullets", but rather it will inseminate the
thought that perhaps you should shoot your neighbor, out of fear. The message
is so masterfully targeted and gamified that even if 1 person starts having
more "critical thinking" and simply shrug off the information, there are 10
more people ready and willing.

------
Anon84
PDF of the report
[https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201719/cmselect/cmcu...](https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201719/cmselect/cmcumeds/1791/1791.pdf)

------
MaysonL
Medical disinformation often rises to the top of search results:

[https://www.wired.com/story/the-complexity-of-simply-
searchi...](https://www.wired.com/story/the-complexity-of-simply-searching-
for-medical-advice/)

~~~
hamilyon2
I found something like this when searched for antibiotic resistance in
russian.

Mainstream, 70-years old boring truth is not the top result. Top result is
fringe controversial study, that is reported all over recent news. This is so
frustrating.

~~~
Const-me
What did you expect? Antibiotic resistance is a new phenomenon. There's no
science in modern Russia, and good sources on the subject like "The Lancet"
and NIH's pubmed are in English.

~~~
tim333
I guess you'd expect that but it could in theory be fixed with better search
algorithms. Perhaps AI that could distinguish The Lancet and crank stuff.

~~~
Const-me
There’s no Russian version of The Lancet, nor Russian translation. Nothing to
distinguish crank stuff from.

People can distinguish if they speak other languages and search global
Internet. Maybe I’m underestimating AI but I don’t think AI can do that
currently, nor will be able in foreseeable future.

------
dsl

       Calls for:
       Social media companies obliged to take down known sources of
       harmful content, including proven sources of disinformation
    

It will be interesting to see how Reddit addresses The_Donald or 8chan deals
with the QAnon nonsense in the wake of this.

 _Edit: Feel free to disagree with the law, but you don 't do that with a
downvote._

~~~
sarcasmOrTears
How do you prove something is disinformation? Time for a ministry of truth? I
can imagine already imagine for example which version of the Convington kids
case would be considered official and information.

~~~
docdeek
This is exactly right. Trusting a government to determine what is true and
what is not, and enforcing that version of truth via shutting down certain
speech and penalising those who speak it, is a bad idea. I’ve no problem with
a government announcing that they believe something is true or false, but I
have a big problem with them restricting the speech of people who happen to
disagree.

~~~
fzeroracer
Instead we have a ministry of truth being perpetuated by sites such as
Youtube, with incredibly harmful information being disseminated and treated as
truth resulting in disease outbreaks and outright denial of history.

In your idealistic world of free speech, the innocent pay the price for the
freedom to spread lies and deceit. At what point do we accept that it has to
be fixed, or are we OK with diseases previously eradicated coming back in full
force?

~~~
colordrops
The difference is that there is also an overwhelming force of true speech to
counter the lies and deceit. Once you start banning speech, only "official"
lies will be allowed. See China.

Where the hell did you get the idea that free speech is only OK until people
start to lie?

You can take my free speech from my cold, dead mouth.

~~~
fzeroracer
If that overwhelming force of true speech worked, then why hasn't climate
change denial, anti-vaccine nonsense etc been eradicated from the public
sphere yet?

In fact, why are those movements growing?

~~~
averros
That is because climate alarmism has been around for quite a while and anybody
who has memory longer than a goldfish's can easily recollect the promised
catastrophes which just didn't happen. Anti-vaccine nonsense is often painted
as refusal to do all vaccines (there are nuts like that but they are few)
rather than not exactly groundless suspicion that SOME new vaccines and
aggressive vaccination regiments are pushed onto public not for the benefit of
people but rather for the benefit of pharmas and because of evident willful
misrepresentation of potential for dangerous side effects - not to mention
that the very notion of forced medication strikes many people as utterly
totalitarian.

These movements are growing precisely because of persistent lying,
exaggerations, and totalitarian inclinations of people who promote climate
"change" (a good example of Orwellian newspeak, isn't it?) and ever-growing
number of must-do vaccines as reason for more taxation and more corporate
welfare. A normal human reaction to being forced to submit is to resist. Even
if force is supposed to be for the victim's own good.

~~~
fzeroracer
> These movements are growing precisely because of persistent lying,
> exaggerations, and totalitarian inclinations of people who promote climate
> "change" (a good example of Orwellian newspeak, isn't it?)

What complete and utter bullshit. Yes, not all of the predictions behind
climate change have come true; science evolves and new predictions or
estimations are made as advancements in technology grow. Yet we've seen many
of the predictions come true and many far worse things start to pop up,
including the mass decline of insects worldwide and the rapidly rising sea
level.

~~~
SuddsMcDuff
_" we've seen many of the predictions come true... including the mass decline
of insects worldwide"_

Interesting you should mention that. No doubt you're referring to the recent
study [1], heavily pushed by the likes of The Guardian [2], the Washington
Post and the BBC, warning of the "collapse of nature" due to declining insect
population.

Did you also know that this study turned out to be flawed to the point of
uselessness? So flawed in fact that the Global Warming Policy Foundation sent
a complaint to its publishers and is calling for its withdrawal? [3]

I think you unwittingly just proved aveross' point vis-à-vis 'climate
alarmism'...

[1]
[https://www.pnas.org/content/115/44/E10397#F1](https://www.pnas.org/content/115/44/E10397#F1)

[2]
[https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/feb/10/plummeti...](https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/feb/10/plummeting-
insect-numbers-threaten-collapse-of-nature)

[3] [https://www.thegwpf.org/hyper-alarming-study-was-
hype/](https://www.thegwpf.org/hyper-alarming-study-was-hype/)

~~~
NeedMoreTea
Hang on just a bloody minute.

The recent study "heavily pushed by the likes of the Guardian" (sic) refers to
_an entirely different_ meta study[1] of 73 global reports. No mention of or
link to the older study you cite.

The meta study concludes intensive agriculture is the main driver of the
declines, particularly the heavy use of pesticides. Urbanisation and climate
change are also significant factors. So the failure or otherwise of the
temperature record in a single location is mostly irrelevant to their
findings. If it is even included in the analysis at all.

What a delightful illustration for a thread on disinformation and fake news.

[1]
[https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S000632071...](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0006320718313636)

~~~
SuddsMcDuff
_" No mention of or link to the older study you cite."_

It's right there in the 4th paragraph.

~~~
NeedMoreTea
Which is link to a previous article, so adds a level of indirection. If you'd
cited that in the first place, fine.

Even if the complaint letter turns out to be upheld (unlikely given the
history of the authors, but you never know), it doesn't affect, or even
question, the conclusion of the meta study in the Guardian piece you _did_
link to. The one that concludes climate is only a significant secondary
factor.

Until said letter is upheld as finding a valid flaw in the study, it's
worthless. That's how science progresses. Individual studies are found
accurate or wanting, further research confirms, disputes or adds precision.

A few steps from the hyperbole of "flawed to the point of uselessness", as
though it is already proven.

------
yunruse
The problem is and always will be that truth is tricky to define, and
“blocking fake news” is immensely easy to exploit for nefarious purposes.

Perhaps the better solution here is not to try to block the flood but to
manipulate it by using market incentives. Notice how high-quality journalism
tends (again, quite subjective) towards subscriptions and sponsorships, as
users will actively want to participate whereas lower-effort content has to
lean heavily on black-box advertising networks. This could be solved with a
few changes: tax advertising a lot more, and use these funds to subsidise
subscriptions and sponsorships in media.

------
cinquemb
Snippets from 2014 CFR discussion:

"…So the question I'm asking myself is can we figure out a way to accelerate
the second curve of human response in a fashion -- in -- in -- in identical
ways to the way DARPA accelerates the first curve of technological
challenges."

"… What about Facebook? What about Twitter? I have no idea what Twitter is
good for. But if it flips out every tyrant in the Middle East, I'm
interested."

Funny how tools work…

~~~
wsgeorge
Source on this?

~~~
cinquemb
[http://web.archive.org/web/20140531073143/http://www.cfr.org...](http://web.archive.org/web/20140531073143/http://www.cfr.org:80/technology-
and-foreign-policy/technology-policymaking-future/p33025)

------
buboard
is it me or does the committee seem lazy? their report is basically a collage
of NYtimes articles, which they quote as evidence , even when it is
speculative

their facebook emails 'evidence' isn t particularly related to their
conclusions either. i mean facebook has been treating its small publishers
unfairly since the age of zynga, just search facebook's forum to find
developers actively calling them out. it's not really related to
disinformation.

i would expect a little more work based on their own secret services about the
extent of russian trolling in their own referendum.most of all i would expect
at least some evidence that these campaigns can change people's opinion. not
liking an electoral outcome cannot be used as evidence that they were
effective

that said, i do hope they ban political advertising to death, because the ones
who benefit from it are the politicians who write this report themselves.
however, regulating the truth? i thought george orwell was british

~~~
pjc50
> basically a collage of NYtimes articles

This is such an inaccurate statement that I'm tempted to joke about it being
fake news.

This report is about as serious as it gets in terms of professional
investigations. There's almost 100 pieces of written evidence and they called
a number of witnesses to give primary evidence (famously including Zuckerberg
who refused to show up). Where they have referred to the NYT, it is properly
cited in the footnotes. Eight of the 349 footnotes refer to the NYT. Care to
retract your accusation of laziness?

> ban political advertising to death

It largely is, in the UK. Certainly by American standards of "free speech".
There's one huge exception: Facebook adverts were unregulated...

~~~
buboard
i was actually expecting something more related to the UK and brexit.
Particularly, evidence that misinformation can change or has changed the minds
of people regarding the EU, or brexit in general . Instead this seems to be a
hodgepodge of well know information about facebook and cambridge analytiuca
and the US elections. they use some very speculative quotes from nytimes such
as this

> allegedly to spread anti-semitic information about George Soros and his
> campaigning activities, afer Mr Soros called Facebook “a menace to society”
> in early 2018.

and some very spurious data such as this

> is interesting to note that, as of 30 November 2018, the online Government
> response to our Report received a total of 1,290 unique page views and the
> PDF has been visited 396 unique times from the website.265 In the month
> following its publication, over 63% of views of the report online were from
> foreign IP addresses (whereas, on average, 80% of viewers of Reports are UK-
> based), and of these, over half were from Russia

in which they seem to be downgrading russian interference to spam bots. Their
own conclusion with regards to interference in UK elections is that "Te
Government should be conducting analysis to understand the extent of Russian
targeting of voters during elections". i.e. "we don't know"

that said i m not disputing the accuracy of what is stated. it's just not
enough, and not surprising at all

------
lbj
> Compulsory Code of Ethics for tech companies overseen by independent
> regulator

I would have loved to see strong moves in favor of critical thinking, rational
argumentation, scientific analysis/study.

The suggested actions will leave us with a government that dictates what it
believes is good ethics and penalizes everyone who does not agree - Not quite
the opposite of what I'd hope for, but its scarily close.

~~~
raxxorrax
As a European I would be strongly in favor of the UK leaving the union as fast
as possible if anything of that kind gets implemented.

~~~
pjc50
The UK is currently subject to less of this kind of regulation than several
other European countries.

~~~
raxxorrax
The UK has been on a severe surveillance and control trip for over a decade
now.

------
AlexTWithBeard
The problem is not fake news. The problem is extremely biased news.

Is everything Trump does is great? Hell, no.

Is everything Trump does is stupid? Probably not either.

But will hardly ever hear from CNN that "actually, Trump's idea here was good,
let's give him a credit".

Same goes the other way round.

------
chvid
The truth is that there has always been misinformation, lies, and manipulation
through media in politics.

Just look at the history of TV and radio regulation in the US and Europe. Look
at how so many future leaders moved from media careers into politics.

The problem is that this time it didn't work as usual and the process had the
wrong outcome (Brexit and mr. Trump). So now "we" are looking for excuses and
reasons to expand government power.

------
willyt
Do we need a trust system of some kind? Maybe journalists should be held
accountable in the same way that doctors, structural engineers, architects
etc. An article should be cryptographically signed by the journalist. If a
journalist publishes incorrect information, report it to their professional
body. Factual inaccuracies should be corrected in the reported article or the
journalist should withdraw their certificate from it. Several egregious
uncorrected factual innacuracies, as judged by a jury of their peers and lay
people, causes a journalist to be struck off and their certificate revoked
forever lableing everything they have written as questionable. Protect the
word ‘News’ in law so that you can’t use it without having certified
journalists writing the copy. People can still publish and read anything they
want just like you are free to go to a homeopath if you want, but there would
be a trust structure in place.

~~~
buboard
a blockchain trust system for reporters (i think the profession of journalist
has come full circle and it's time to retire the label)

------
fzeroracer
Considering the amount of damage anti-vaccine hysteria and disinformation has
caused, I can't say I disagree with their conclusions. If debating them with
facts and logic actually worked, then we should've seen the movement fade away
years ago.

It's not, and it's growing as a result of faulty search algorithms being used
by people to spread conspiracy theories and fake nonsense. It's exactly why
flat earth nonsense is spreading as well [1].

[1] [https://www.theguardian.com/science/2019/feb/17/study-
blames...](https://www.theguardian.com/science/2019/feb/17/study-blames-
youtube-for-rise-in-number-of-flat-earthers)

~~~
alexis_fr
The media has its own disinformation. For example the wage gap « at equal work
» is the biggest statistical error ever made (never were basic criteria taken
into account), thousands of researchers voiced that the way the media
presented it made people think women were paid less for the same work...

...and yet researchers couldn’t get their voice to be heard. Given the number
of unfair laws and bylaws that were passed on the understanding that women
were paid less, the wage gap has been a lie at a huge scale.

~~~
robbick
I regularly quote said statistic - can you link me some reliable sources
supporting your claim?

~~~
belorn
The key word in such research is called "Adjusted pay gap" vs "Unadjusted pay
gap".

Differences in hours worked, occupations chosen, education, job experience,
and location are the big ones. Then there are a few additional ones like age
and health.

Depending on which study you either end up with a very minor (~5%) difference
between women and men, or none.

With unadjusted pay gap that chooses to limit the selection to fully employed
you get a number around 60% in the US. If you don't limit and count all
citizen you get a weird number, and if you look at the problem from a social
economic status perspective you get an even weirder results.

~~~
robbick
That is really interesting, and not what I had been lead to believe, but could
you provide me with any reliable sources to this affect?

------
sbhn
Fake news is new media. It must be really important if google news has a
special section dedicated to it on the right column where you can see it
without needing to scroll down the page. The uk has the bbc to spread its
agenda, mostly in favour of further colonisation and to protect its weapons
supply network across the middle east , and doesnt want the competition. Fake
news is actually competition that makes the ‘real’ news try harder.

~~~
growlist
> further colonisation

What? UK has been de-colonising for decades. Other former colonial powers held
on much harder, e.g. France.

