![]() ![]() Be particularly vigilant, if those anonymous sources make general claims, that are impossible to verify. What is the source of the claims? Disinformation actors often conjure false anonymous “insider” sources, which may not even exist! (The most notable example of this is the so-called Q-anon conspiracy).A Facebook friend is not necessarily an expert in a given matter, and if you come across an expert, make sure their expertise is in relevant field. Who is the author of this message? Can you find any of their previous work? As well-respected journalists and experts always have a track record, that is easy to find.Is this content reliable? News is often rather dull, except on rare occasions like when two guys rescued a dog from icy water and it turned out to be a wolf! If the content makes you agitated pause and make sure to check: has anyone else reported it? How do you know this is true? Pay attention to how images, emojis, headlines are used - are they trying to evoke a particular emotion in you? And remember, a high number of followers does not necessarily mean a social media account is a reliable source!.To practise information hygiene – pause, and think before you share or engage with the content online. In the same manner, information hygiene can slow down the spread of harmful misleading information, especially on the social media. ![]() Hygiene, such as frequent hand-washing, helps to protect us from COVID-19. Just like vaccines can provide immunity to viruses, including COVID-19, we can build immunity to disinformation. Such a moniker aimed not only to mock the vaccine producer, but also to tap into fears about the safety and “purity” of the vaccine. For example, to discredit one of the COVID-19 vaccine producers, Russian state-controlled media took a part of a truth, namely, that their vaccine was developed using a chimpanzee viral vector, and rebranded it as “ the monkey vaccine”. Very often vaccine-related disinformation messages are built around a “ kernel of truth” that make them more believable and more difficult to call out. ![]() Past research has shown, that a mix of “novelty” and emotions help falsehoods to spread nearly 6 times faster than the truth. These are highly complex topics that encourage us to seek new information (especially so at times when little was known about the novel coronavirus), and at the same time are likely to evoke emotions of curiosity, fear, anxiety, and concern. Indeed, vaccines, and in general health-related issues, provide a fertile ground for all sorts of disinformation. The global pandemic, accompanied by what the World Health Organization called an “ infodemic”, fuelled the spread of anti-vaccination disinformation. Petersburg, Russia, tweeted both pro- and anti-vaccine messages to sow discord and confusion and undermine public trust in vaccination. Those malicious accounts, some of which were linked to the infamous “ troll factory” based in St. In 2018 the American Journal of Public Health published the findings of a research, indicating that over 93 percent of messages about vaccines posted on Twitter between 20 came from malicious accounts. In fact, the “vaccine scare” has been present in the undergrowth of information space for quite some time, successfully exploited by disinformation actors, state and non-state. However, since the beginning of the pandemic there has been a huge volume of misleading information and blatant conspiracy theories about the vaccines. We read about diseases like smallpox in history books, rather than news websites, precisely because of vaccines, which helped to eradicate them. Vaccinations are one of the greatest successes in public health. ![]()
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