Understanding Online Misinformation

Kalina Bontcheva

University of Sheffield

IFDaD 2022, 18 November 2022

XAIvsDisinfo

UKRI Grant: EP/W011212/1

Grant Agreement 871042

Disinformation is cross-platform, cross-lingual, cross-modal, and cross-border

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Grant Agreement 871042

Ukraine-related Disinformation Dataset

Dataset sources �( 1 Feb and 30 April 22):

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1. EUvsDsinfo�Debunk links - 110�Disinfo links - 311
2. ClaimReview�Debunk links - 344�Disinfo links - 439��

Disinformation Links

Debunked claim

https://euvsdisinfo.eu/�https://www.datacommons.org/factcheck/download

Grant Agreement 871042

Comparative Analysis of Engagement with

Ukraine-Related Debunks and Disinformation

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Dataset

750 disinformation links and 456 debunk links from

1 February to 30 April 2022. Tweet count:

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Key findings:

• Spread of Ukraine-related disinformation and

debunks is closely related

• Disinformation is significantly more shared and retweeted as compared to debunks
• Debunks trigger certain reduction in overall disinformation spread eventually, albeit not instantly
• About 18% of fact-checks are about claims, similar variants of which have already been fact-checked

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False narratives that keep being debunked

• Out of the 456 debunk claims in our dataset, 84 of them (18%) were found to be highly similar to false narratives that have already been debunked by another fact-checking organisation.

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Grant Agreement 871042

Tracking COVID-19 disinformation narratives

A diet rich in alkaline foods can eliminate the coronavirus

Grant Agreement 871042

Original disinformation: conspiracy theory

pro-vaccine

vaccine - hesitants

anti-vaccine

How can we improve research in this area

• Improve cooperation and data access between platforms and researchers, with the help of an independent intermediary�
• Improve transparency and accountability
• Provision of daily data on a per EU country and per language basis, in a standardized, structured format via common APIs
• Engagement and propagation statistics for moderated problematic content, mainstream news and unmoderated over-performing content
• Creation of an independent intermediary body
• broker between platforms and researchers for data access purposes;
• provision of data storage and processing infrastructure
• provision of EU-wide training and capacity building for researchers
• fostering of cross-language and cross-country research collaborations

Thank you! Questions?

Kalina Bontcheva

@kbontcheva

IFDaD 2022, 18 November 2022

Grant Agreement 871042