Data voids on social networks are spreading misinformation and causing real world harm. Here are some ideas on how to fix the problem.

Keywords related to rumor can help us understand and respond to dangerous activities online.

The ocean’s twilight zone is, first and foremost, a reminder that our understanding of misinformation online is severely lacking because of limited data.

“On Google, searching for ‘coronavirus facts’ gives you a full overview of official statistics and visualizations. That’s not the case for ‘coronavirus truth.'”

Applying an overlay to images of misinformation prevents further amplification of harmful content.

In this short report, we explore emergent tactics and offer a vocabulary for anyone who wants to label the role AI has played in their creation. In part two, we reflect on the questions, tensions and dilemmas they raise.

Though psychological concepts originate in academia, many have found their way into everyday language. Cognitive dissonance, first described in 1957, is one; confirmation bias is another. And this is part of the problem, as they are regularly misunderstood. I cover the list the major psychological concepts that relate to misinformation and why we’re so vulnerable to it in the first place.

In the second part of this series on the psychology of misinformation, I cover the psychological concepts that are relevant to corrections, such as fact checks and debunks. One key theme that will resurface is the central problem of correction: Once we’re exposed to misinformation, it’s very hard to get it out of our heads.

In the third part of this series on misinformation psychology, I explain the psychological concepts that can help us by building our mental (and therefore social) resilience. What you’ll find is that many of the resources we need to slow down misinformation are right there in our brains, waiting to be used.