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Problem statement

The phrase fake news is synonymous with misinformation. Reporting hoaxes and misleading information has become commonplace in mainstream media due to the popularity of social media, especially WhatsApp owing to its simplicity.

Misinformation has been a menace, more so during COVID and election times. Governments resort to blanket ban/ internet shutdowns under such circumstances. Incidents of circulation of fake news, saw nearly a three-fold rise in 2020 over 2019, according to the latest National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) data

Here I have tried to identify the gaps in WhatsApp to curb misinformation and apply behavioral insights to tackle the problem, keeping in mind the app's simplicity.

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Biases and barriers – behavioral insights

Herd bias – Forwarded tag in WhatsApp may have a negative effect by wanting them to join the herd, feeling of missing out
No barriers or cues to think again before forwarding fake ones
Anchoring to the initial information in fake messages for eg see image below, Amazon black Friday sale seems legit

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Gaps in WhatsApp

Encryption of messages disallows us to identify the source of fake news
The messages marked ‘forwarded’ or ‘forwarded many times’ doesn’t tell people if it’s fake or real
Copying the fake message and pasting it to a chat is possible, even avoiding the forwarded tag

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Solution – Crowdsourcing spam ��1. Intrinsic motivation - putting trust on community to verify �

A user who clicked a link to a fraudulent transaction, could come back and mark it as false (one time per person)

If a message is marked false by 50 people, it will be marked as ‘marked false’. If the message is marked as true by 100 people, it will be marked as ‘marked verified’

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1.2 Visual cues and social norms

Once a message is forwarded, instead of forwarded tag it will now have a ‘not verified’ tag

When a person hovers the cursor to share without verification, the info button blinks, a cue to open it before sharing

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1.3 Social norms – Feedback and comparison to people

Gives feedback to the people that a large number of people have marked it as false and to proceed with caution

Again, when the person hovers the arrow over ‘Take the risk, share’ share button, it gives a visual cue to a person to go to the options (where ways to fact check is listed)

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�1.4 Visual cues and Pre commitment

Reference : http://theconversation.com/war-on-fake-news-could-be-won-with-the-help-of-behavioral-science-96093

1. A voluntary pledge that a person could sign anytime will act as a pre commitment to them

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Rationale

1. When a person signs a voluntary pledge, it targets their self concept. They think of themselves as champions and increases intrinsic motivation to be sceptical of info

2. A direct comparison with other people acting irresponsibly can encourage people not to share news without verification

3. Small notifications prompting user to think whether they have verified the info creates a barrier to share the defaults

4. It also creates time for slow thinking

5. And even if a person resists and thinks of sharing it without verification, a visual cue is given towards the menu to remind of the voluntary pledge they have taken to be a verification champion and info on how to check fake news like factchecking tip lines

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Drawbacks

Although crowdsourcing spam usually works, we can’t be hundred percent sure that the information ‘marked false’ is a fake one
Some of the people may feel a slight more inconvenience with the app, if the additions in the app are not backed by community awareness about fake news
After a while, people may adapt and bypass visual cues
A fake message could still be copied and pasted to another person’s chat

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Measuring impact

1. Conduct a random sample survey to access if people skip the visual cues and other behavioural application features in the application

2. See NCRB data to see if fake news cases have decreased

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