More than 9 in 10 people (94%) in the UK have reported witnessing misinformation on social media, according to a new nationally representative survey published today (Thursday 30 May) by The Alan Turing Institute.
The new research examined how people interact with different strategies to protect themselves from misinformation. It also aims to understand their exposure to misinformation, their concerns about it and their level of trust in different institutions.
The majority of people (72%) interviewed were found to be comfortable with platforms using ‘behind the scenes’ interventions. This includes demonetisation, cutting financial incentives for creators of disinformation; downranking content, making content less visible; early moderation, screening content before it goes live; and deplatforming, removing users from a social media platform to counter misinformation.
However, the research shows that most people were unaware of the interventions they could use themselves to counter misinformation. Just 3% reported they had taken a media literacy course, and 7% had used self-help resources.
This demonstrates the need to encourage people to use available tools to understand how to analyse and verify content they are presented with.
With so much public discourse taking place online, and at a time of many elections globally, it is crucial to understand not only which interventions against misinformation are effective, but also when and how members of the public are willing to engage with such interventions, and which people are most likely to do so.
Dr Florence Enock, Senior Research Associate in online safety at The Alan Turing Institute, said: “With the huge increase in technologies that can quickly and convincingly create and spread false content online, it is critical that the public are equipped with the right tools to protect themselves.
“However, our research highlights that most people do not use available resources even though they are shown to be effective. It is crucial that more is done to encourage people to use misinformation interventions, such as media literacy courses, and that online platforms provide their users with effective and accessible ways to report misinformation when they see it.”
Dr Jonathan Bright, Head of Online Safety at The Alan Turing Institute, said: “Concern about misinformation is undoubtedly extremely high. The lack of trust in mainstream news organisations demonstrates a wider scepticism of information more generally. It’s really important that people feel they can have confidence in information they receive from reliable sources, particularly during a crucial election year for the UK and the US. It’s clear there’s a lot of work to be done to instil confidence in people.”