A wicked problem with tame solutions

First Wieambilla, now Porepunkah.  

Violent fixations and cold-blooded shootings of police have again shocked our nation. But unfortunately, these offline actions weren’t a surprise for those of us who have studied online mis and disinformation since the tech transformations of media convergence.

Warnings and solutions for the benefit of society from those in industry and academia get the “that’s a great idea” treatment; and then remain largely ignored as stakeholders go back to their silos. But as we were recently reminded, the dangers have especially festered since COVID-19.

The pandemic opened the way for seemingly disparate groups to join or co-opt movements in an effort to grow their supporter base.  As was also seen in New Zealand’s anti-vaccine protests, this was often at the expense of citizens who simply wanted to turn out to voice their concerns, but got overtaken, and overshadowed by extreme movements.

At the time platforms and social media organisations worked consistently to ensure credible information was promoted.

Journalists worked tirelessly around the clock to track, check and provide credible reports.

Even influencers took on some of the toughest vaccine hesitant crowds in Australia in an effort to use their influence for good.

Meanwhile, as leading science communicator Elizabeth Finkel AM, who studied COVID-19 medical responses noted: "Australia’s scientists got it right clinically when many other countries didn’t."

But it wasn’t enough.

And it’s not going to be enough in this era of information pollution. The reason being because it is not sustained. It will never be enough if we simply keep “talking the talk” about solutions and don’t supply the resources required to stop people from falling down the rabbit hole.

Disinformation and its cousin misinformation

The levers used by platforms and social media companies to slow the spread of misleading and downright dangerous information are arguably straightforward and often automated to use against disinformation in the form of inauthentic behaviour. But enter disinformation’s seemingly meek cousin: misinformation.

Misinformation takes us to murky waters - it can range from being a well-meaning but harmful mistake, or simply one’s political opinion or bias, to a post that gives a notion that provides a sense of belonging. And from there the gateway opens freely as noisy, polluted information attaches to misinformation like a vine to a tree. Gradually – and sometimes not so gradually - the vine chokes off sunlight through a world of conspiracy theories for those who feel unheard or disaffected.  

From there, just as an online romance scammer connects and manipulates, so too do dangerous ideologies emerge, orchestrated by agents of disinformation who use tactics for their own financial reward or power, to prey upon those left standing in the online gateway.

Academic research surveys showed that during the COVID-19 pandemic, Australian journalists were crying out for more resources and training to report in an “era of misinformation and disinformation”. 

Journalists need support to protect information integrity

Complain all you like about “the media”, but at the time journalists who truly cared about the outcomes for society simply wanted support for their efforts to enhance information integrity. Journalists like those who, since Porepunkah, have scoured through posts and reverse-engineered online and offline evidence in the lead up to the horrific events.

This year’s Digital News Report noted that one in 4 Australians “say social media is their main source of news”. But it’s likely that most of the time, it’s not news. Feel free to go there for some of your entertainment but do know that it’s not news in the sense of journalistic content. Professional journalism is hard, time-consuming work.

So exactly what are Australians consuming in social media as information from which to base their decisions in life and in a democracy?

Why are vines of low-quality information able to so easily spread through an information ecosystem? During COVID-19, Australia introduced a groundbreaking disinformation and misinformation code of practice for platforms and social media – but there remain many questions.

What about the proudly laissez-faire chat apps that are not signatories? It has long been known that those who are “deplatformed” from Facebook head to darker more “permissive” parts of the internet. Yet these companies operate in our jurisdiction.

What is the incentive for these companies – whether signatories or not - to promote open conversations but also provide decent levels of credibility signaling?

And, where is the news you can use to make up your mind on key civic issues?

What’s missing

Trained and supported journalists know how to forensically gather and test information. They understand how scientific methods work and will turn to scientists who are true experts in their lanes. Journalists can then in turn support the influencers who our young people are turning to on social media for relatability.

Without such information integrity, the risk continues where extreme movements co-opt spaces – and simply move to take advantage of new conflicts as these “opportunities” arise. And with them the potential for new audiences to fall down the rabbit hole.

News literacy proponents around the world teach students to consider the wider information ecosystems, including politics and propaganda. Australia was once the ‘gold standard’ in gun reform. But events from Wieambilla, and now Porepunkah, are questioning the creeping influences, and we read reports that “Australia has more guns than before Port Arthur massacre”.

This, in combination with our lack of credibility signaling in the digital world, is not a good recipe for society as recent offline events have shown.