Disinformation

A seemingly endless stream of needy causes compete for our attention and money every day. Our emails, mailboxes and phones are bombarded by charities asking for generous donations to help.

Paris, November 13, 2015. A European capital is badly hit by fundamentalists who legitimise their crimes by using a holy name: an impactful event that shocked the whole world. It is neither the first nor, unfortunately, the last tragedy whose consequences on the general public have become the subject of analysis on social media.

It has been said before that the wars of the 21st century are hybrid wars, in the sense that, in addition to the environments in which the hostilities have taken place until now–land, water and air–a fourth environment has appeared: the virtual one.

In an interview published by Inc.com, 24-year-old Romanian Ovidiu Dobrota, from Oradea, Romania, boasted that his fake news site Ending The Fed had a substantial impact in supporting Donald Trump in the presidential elections. According to a Buzzfeed analysis, his boasting is well-founded.

The generation born with the tablet and the smartphone in its arms, but which ends up being exploited by big data cultivators and controlled by radicalization and polarization, can become the generation that implements anti-democratic movements.

In Europe, few people know Gwyneth Paltrow as anything other than an American actress. In the United States, however, her "modern lifestyle" wellness brand called goop is growing her reputation—in a negative way.

Over the last decade and a half, various legal disputes have brought to the attention of the public the issue of the social responsibility of Big Tech companies to control the flow of information on their channels. But in mid-January 2021, people of all ideological colours had indisputable proof that the decisions of technology giants have ramifications that go far beyond the commercial...

Arguments must be convincing and, in order to convince, they must be valid—the minimum requirement of persuasion.

Our reality isn’t always a calm place. Feelings of safety and peace that are so necessary for our well-being often elude us. What is happening today on a global level only goes to show how fragile our world is, and how easily we can lose control over the things we thought we had mastered.

After the authorities in different countries announced a relaxation of the restrictions, people started to impatiently waiting for that, maybe even with plans to recover last bits of a confiscated spring.

The epidemic of false information in this worldwide pandemic is even more infectious than the virus itself. Fortunately, there is a vaccine for this epidemic of fake news: quality information and information filters. However, not everyone has been vaccinated. Here is an immunization effort.