Abstract
This paper explores social media’s transformation from a champion of free speech into a matrix of disinformation, fueling fake news, hate speech, and threats to democracy. It delves into definitional challenges, defining fake news as intentionally false or misleading content mimicking journalism, often amplified during events like the 2016 U.S. election through bots and viral sharing. Distinctions are drawn between misinformation (unintentional falsehoods), disinformation (deliberate harmful spread), and propaganda (systematic manipulation of opinions), with overlaps in academic, legal, and international contexts, such as UNESCO’s framework of information disorder including malinformation. Legal responses vary, with nations like France enacting laws against manipulative information, while others lack clarity. The text examines production and amplification mechanisms, identifying actors like governments, NGOs, and networks that operate anonymously to sway public opinion. Digital platforms—WhatsApp, Instagram, TikTok, and Snapchat—serve as key vectors, leveraging features like encryption, algorithmic feeds, and micro-targeting ads for precise dissemination. Social bots, accounting for over 60% of online traffic, simulate engagement to boost visibility, while advertising tools enable personalized campaigns, as seen in elections. Traditional media and partisan outlets further reinforce narratives. Ultimately, the paper highlights the challenges in tracing disinformation’s origins and impacts, noting its role in eroding trust and societal divides, and calls for regulatory clarity, platform accountability, and interdisciplinary research to combat this pervasive “information disorder” in the digital age.
Keywords: Disinformation, Fake News, Social Media, Propaganda, Bots, Micro-Targeting, Digital Platforms.
INTRODUCTION
Social media, once hailed as a champion of free speech and democracy, is now facing heavy criticism for fueling disinformation, fake news, hate speech, and even undermining democratic systems.
1.1 Definitional Challenges
1.1.1 Fake News
The rise of “fake news” on platforms like Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, and YouTube—especially after the 2016 U.S. Presidential election—has sparked huge interest across fields like politics, media, and tech. This surge in deliberately crafted false stories has raised serious alarms about how it’s deepening political divides and eroding trust in institutions, ultimately threatening democracy itself[1].
At its core, fake news means false or misleading info that’s dressed up to look like legitimate journalism, especially online. The phrase “fake news” really took off in recent years, though it dates back to the late 1800s. Back then, people more commonly said “false news,” and “fake” wasn’t as trendy, per the Merriam-Webster Dictionary.[2] The Cambridge English Dictionary puts it simply: fake news includes “false stories that appear to be news, spread on the internet or using other media, usually created to influence political views or as a joke.”[3] But it’s not just about politics—it pops up in everyday news too.
Data from Google Trends and academic databases like Web of Science show a massive spike in research and searches on fake news starting in November 2016This boom ties directly to the 2016 election and Donald Trump’s style of campaigning, which helped make the term go viral.[4] In fact, Trump gets a lot of credit for popularizing it. Google Trends data points to October 2016 as when online interest really exploded[5]
During that election, fake news spread like wildfire on social media, often amplified by “bots,” as researchers from the Oxford Internet Institute found[6]These are automated fake accounts designed to like, retweet, or share specific posts to make them seem more popular[7]Fake news creators use bots to boost visibility, and the fast pace of today’s tech makes it easy for this stuff to go viral—people stumble upon it before they can fact-check.
In a 2017 study called “Social Media and Fake News in the 2016 Election,” economists Hunt Allcott and Matthew Gentzkow from Stanford described fake news as “intentionally and often sensationally false” content meant to trick readers[8]Lawyers David Klein and Gregory Wueller see it as “the online publication of intentionally or knowingly false statements of fact.”[9] Media expert Nolan Higdon offers a broader take: fake news is “false or misleading content presented as news,” delivered through any format—from spoken word to digital screens[10]It’s also been called “information pollution[11]“media manipulation[12]or even “information warfare.”[13]
Philosopher Regina Rini, in her essay “Fake News and Partisan Epistemology,” gives one of the most thorough definitions out there: A fake news story claims to report real-world events, often copying the style of real journalism, but its creators know it’s mostly untrue. They spread it hoping it’ll get shared widely and fool at least some readers.
Another philosopher, Gelfert, describes fake news as the intentional presentation of false or misleading claims as news, where the misleading nature is built into the content itself.[14] A study by Tandoc and colleagues, which reviewed academic papers from 2003 to 2017, found that the term “fake news” has been used to cover a wide range of things—everything from satirical news and parodies to outright fabrications, manipulations, advertising, and propaganda[15]> Some researchers even avoid pinning down a strict definition of fake news, sometimes using it interchangeably with terms like “disinformation” or “propaganda” when exploring the topic. This lack of clarity is also reflected in legal discussions around the world, where countries are still debating how to define and regulate fake news through national laws.
For example, France’s laws on “manipulation of information” try to define fake news as “any assertion of a fact that is inaccurate or deceptive.” The focus here is on false information that is deliberately spread online in an artificial or automated way, especially when it could affect the fairness of elections. In 2017, Italy proposed a bill to tackle fake news, describing it as online news that is false, exaggerated, or biased, but the bill was never passed[16]Later, in 2018, Italy’s Ministry of Interior introduced a system to report content that is clearly baseless, biased, or defamatory[17]Germany’s Net DG Act of 2017 didn’t explicitly define fake news but inspired similar laws in other countries.[18]
In contrast, countries like the United States and India don’t have specific laws defining fake news. Because of this, as Martens and colleagues point out, there is still no universal agreement on what exactly “fake news” means.[19]
[1] The Real Story of ‘Fake News”, https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/the-real-story-of-fakenews.
[2] Fake news; https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/fake-news
[3] The Real Story of ‘Fake News”, https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/the-real-story-of-fakenews.
[4] Ibid
[5]Leetaru, Kalev. “Did Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg Coin The Phrase ‘Fake News’?”. Forbes. Retrieved April 19, 2017
[6] Markoff, John “Automated Pro-Trump Bots Overwhelmed Pro-Clinton Messages, Researchers Say”. The New York Times. Retrieved November 17, 2016
[7] Resnick, Gideon “How Pro-Trump Twitter Bots Spread Fake News”. The Daily Beast. Retrieved November 17, 2016.
[8] Ibid
[9] Klein, D. and Wueller J, Fake news: a legal perspective. Journal of Internet Law 20(10): 5-13, 2017.
[11] Wardle, C., & Derakhshan, H. (2017). Information disorder: Toward an interdisciplinary framework for research and policy making. Report presented to Council of Europe, 27. Council of Europe.
[12] Warwick, A., & Lewis, R. (2017). Media manipulation and disinformation online. Data & Society
[13]Khaldarova, I., &Pantti, M. (2016). Fake news. Journalism Practice, 10(7), 891– 901. https://doi.org/10.1080/17512786.2016.1163237
[14]Gelfert A., Fake news: a definition. Informal Logic 38 (1):84-117, 2018,
[15] Tandoc E. et al., Defining “fake news” a typology of scholarly definitions. Digital Journalism 6(2): 137-153, 2018, p. 137
[16] Letter of the Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression No OL ITA 1/2018, 20 March 2018, p. 1, https://www.ohchr.org/Documents/Issues/Opinion/Legislation/OL-ITA-1-2018.pdf
[17] European Center for Press and Media Freedom, Tackling fake news, the Italian way, 22 May 2018, https://www.rcmediafreedom.eu/Tools/Legal-Resources/Tackling-fake-news-the-Italian-way
[18] Human Rights Watch, German: flawed social media law, 14 February 2018, https://www.hrw.org/news/2018/02/14/germany-flawed-social-media-law
[19] Martens, B. et al., The digital transformation of news media and the rise of disinformation and fake news. JRC Digital Economy Working Paper 2018-02, p. 5, https://ec.europa.eu/jrc/sites/jrcsh/files/jrc111529.pdf. For the perceptions of the public on the definition of ‘fake news’, consult: Nielsen, R. and Graves, L., “News you don’t believe”: Audience perspectives on fake news. Factsheet: October 2017, http://reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk/sites/default/files/2017- 10/Nielsen%26Graves_factsheet_1710v3_FINAL_download.pdf)