(Dis)information Wars
The Brookings Institution
AUTHORS
Adrian Casillas, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Sloan School of Management
Maryam Farboodi, MIT Sloan, NBER and CEPR
Layla Hashemi, George Mason University
Maryam Saeedi, Carnegie Mellon University
Steven Wilson, Brandeis University
ABSTRACT
With the unprecedented rise of internet access across the globe, social media platforms have emerged as prominent vehicles for displaying dissent. In response, numerous entities engage in spreading fake news on these platforms. We focus on a specific form of disinformation supply on social media —disinformation wars: the intentional spread of fake news while pretending to be an ordinary account. We demonstrate that this new form of disinformation supply is considerably more effective in spreading fake news on X, formerly known as Twitter, compared to traditional propaganda. We then propose a novel approach to preempt the spread by assigning a disinformation score to accounts and assess the effectiveness of the score disclosure policy in limiting the spread of disinformation on the platform.
INTRODUCTION
In countries with authoritarian regimes, traditional means of information dissemination such as newspapers, TV, and radio are heavily controlled by the central government. In the early 21st century, the introduction of social media and decentralized platforms proved to be a groundbreaking development in these countries. The rapid improvement of big data technologies enhanced convenient access at an unprecedented rate and made these platforms prominent vehicles for displaying dissidence during episodes of unrest.
Soon after, authoritarian regimes intervened by limiting internet access and censoring social media. In parallel, they started to spread disinformation on social media through propaganda accounts—accounts that are publicly pro-government and spread false news in an attempt to change the narrative in favor of the government. However, the widespread access of the public to multiple sources of information has reduced the effectiveness of this tactic. As such, governments have turned to a smarter approach to supply fake news. They engage in a “disinformation war,” i.e., they create imposter accounts who spread fake news on social media platforms while pretending to be unbiased, ordinary accounts (Hynes, 2021).
Disinformation wars have several advantages as they do not require exerting force and they are difficult to trace, yet they disrupt the flow of information. Therefore, they derange the opposition movement without apparent aggression.1 Furthermore, it is difficult to identify the pieces of fake news that have originated from imposter accounts, as these accounts imitate the behavior of ordinary accounts in many respects. Although both strategies spread fake news, unlike classic propaganda, disinformation wars are not intended to control the narrative in favor of the central government. Rather, they are a means to disturb the narrative to derail and discredit the protest movement. To delineate the supply of fake news on social media platforms, it is crucial to understand both strategies concurrently.