#informationdissemination — Public Fediverse posts

AFP: The Ukrainian social media channels tracking Russian missiles. “The chances of a missile attack on Kyiv that night were around 50%, according to the administrator of a social media channel monitoring Russian air raids. His channel, Aeris Rimor — roughly derived from the Latin for Searcher of the Skies — is one of dozens sending real-time messages about incoming drones and missiles.”

Meduza: How Russia is impersonating French news outlets in a bid to influence France’s next presidential election. “Russian disinformation networks have launched an active campaign to interfere in France’s presidential election, which is set for April 2027. Over the past two weeks, at least three cases have come to light in which these networks spread fake news about possible candidates on […]

Euro News: From TikTok videos to political claims: How misleading information spread during the Ceuta crisis. “It remains unclear what exactly triggered the unprecedented surge into Ceuta, with officials and experts pointing to a combination of factors including economic hardship in Morocco, social media misinformation, criminal networks and the actions of authorities on both sides of the […]

Arkansas Times: Despite debunkings, misinformation about Little Rock’s ‘New Africa’ persists. “Misleading social media posts about a Little Rock housing development established by a Muslim organization have been spreading online since April, fomenting Islamophobia among gullible Facebook boomers and Republican state legislators. We talked to the people behind the project to see what’s […]

Meduza: Russians who film Ukrainian attacks and post them on social media are being detained, fined, and forced to apologize on camera. “Most regional administrations in Russia have already banned filming of strikes and their aftermath, but Russians keep posting footage of fires and flying missiles on social media. Mediazona reports on what this has meant for some of them. Meduza is publishing […]

Gizmodo: People Are Generating a Flood of Fake News About Trump That Does No Reputational Damage Whatsoever. “President Donald Trump regularly posts some of the most bizarre content on the internet, from images of himself as Jesus Christ to AI videos of diarrhea being dumped on liberal protesters. But there’s been a weird trend over the past year: social media users take Trump’s strange […]

The Conversation: Meta‑backed research finds exposure to ‘untrustworthy’ social media is rare. The fine print is less reassuring. “A new study published today in Science Advances offers the most rigorous answers yet. It comes from a collaboration between Meta and academic researchers who studied the 2020 United States election. It was run from inside the machine – on the live feeds of […]

Euronews: AI chatbots citing Russian propaganda sourced from EU-sanctioned outlet. “AI chatbots are citing Russia propaganda from EU-sanctioned outlets, researchers say, raising questions about how hybrid warfare is expanding to influence large language models (LLMs). Mainstream large language models (LLMs) such as Google Gemini have reportedly cited pro-Russian propaganda from an EU-sanctioned […]

CS Monitor: Why Greeks are going to TikTok for news instead of newspapers or TV. “Greeks don’t turn to traditional media for news; they go to TikTok, Instagram, and the like. That puts them at the forefront of how news consumption is trending globally – and makes them a lens on how the future of news might look.”

University of Nebraska-Lincoln: Study explores social media’s role in tornado disaster communication. “When a powerful EF-4 tornado tore through Rolling Fork, Mississippi, on March 24, 2023, social media became a critical tool for sharing weather warnings, damage reports and recovery information. But a new study from University of Nebraska–Lincoln media scholar Cory Armstrong found that the […]

Nautilus: How a Twitter Post Discovered a New Wasp Species to Japan. “In 2018, insect enthusiast and author Kanji Toyosaki posted a photo to Twitter (now X) of a tiny wasp laying its eggs on a praying mantis’ egg case. The photo caught the attention of Japanese entomologist Taisuke Kawano of the Kyushu University Museum, who formally described the male of the species (Eupelmus curvator) for […]

The Conversation: Want to be a better reader? Here’s how to practise active reading. “A 2024 survey of 500 influencers across 45 countries found that 62 per cent do not carry out rigorous fact-checking before sharing information. Navigating today’s digital information landscape, then, requires strong critical evaluation skills.Reading plays a central role in this process by serving not only […]

NiemanLab: Overwhelmed by news on social? SaySo is betting a smaller, vetted creator feed is the answer. “SaySo’s head of product Cydney Adams said she and her team wanted to create a space where users could trust the information they were consuming while creators could serve an engaged audience.”

CBC: Facebook is paying people overseas promoting Alberta separatism. “Nieta Aqila is among 14 overseas accounts CBC identified in four popular Alberta independence Facebook groups. The accounts have posted politically divisive content about Alberta separatism, Western annexation and other hot-button Canadian topics within the past two months.”

WCMH: Central Ohio resident launches innovative national missing persons platform. “A central Ohio man has created a national missing persons database with a social media-style design that allows users to swipe through cases and enables law enforcement to issue local alerts.”

Union of Concerned Scientists: Your Anti-Disinformation Safety Chain for Danger Season. “We’re now officially in Danger Season 2026—the period between May and October when North America experiences its worst climate impacts—and we should expect disinformation to ramp up on social media and other platforms. It’s the time when maintaining what I call the ‘safety chain’ matters most.”

NiemanLab: You couldn’t create a more anti-news internet if you tried. “The loss of local media in particular is associated with greater loneliness, lower awareness of public officials, and more corruption. It’s like an invisible tax levied on our communities that we pay civically, cognitively and sometimes even literally, in the form of higher local bond prices due to more wasteful […]

Mother Jones: Antisemitic Hantavirus Conspiracy Theories Are Spreading—and the Platforms Are Hands Off. “A popular social media conspiracy theory about a recent cluster of hantavirus cases claims that the word ‘hanta’ means ‘scam,’ ‘fraud,’ or ‘nonsense’ in ‘Hebrew slang.’ That’s more or less where the theory ends and dark suggestion takes over.”

Search Engine Land: Can a fake brand win in AI search? New experiment says yes. “We wanted to look beyond rankings and understand how AI systems discover, interpret, and cite information. So we expanded the project into a more ambitious set of experiments on AI search and LLM visibility. For the next phase, we created a new fictional brand in a real niche with real competition to see how […]

CIDRAP: New global health misinformation survey reveals deep divides. “About a quarter of people worldwide say they believe that raw milk is healthier than pasteurized milk, that use of acetaminophen during pregnancy causes autism, and that vaccines are used for population control. These are a few of the harmful health claims that were surveyed in the 5th annual Edelman Trust Barometer Special […]

NiemanLab: Social traffic kinda stinks for news publishers now, in 3 charts. “A lot of the discussion of news publishers’ traffic in recent months has focused on a decline in search traffic. But social traffic is down, too.”

New York Times: How Iran’s Information War Machine Operates Online. This link goes to a gift article. “The New York Times reconstructed how Iran was able to use overt and covert global networks alongside unwitting participants to spread its message through social media, state-affiliated news organizations and American influencers. Here is how the claim went from a single post to a global […]

Poynter: Fact-checking has to go where misinformation actually spreads. “In this environment, fact-checking remains indispensable, but its relevance can no longer be measured solely by the publication of articles. If it wants to continue to matter, fact-checking must stop imagining itself only as an editorial product and begin acting as a form of civic infrastructure. This shift begins with […]

PsyPost: New research suggests truth has a natural competitive edge over misinformation. “Truthful messages are more persuasive and more likely to be shared than false ones, according to new research published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. The findings, drawn from four large experiments, challenge the widespread belief that misinformation naturally spreads more […]

The Conversation: It’s not just gen Z – older adults need help spotting online misinformation too. “In 2024, nine in ten people in the UK reported seeing misinformation on social media. Yet only 3% of the population had taken a media literacy course. While there is working being done to ensure technology is accessible, users must have the skills and confidence to recognise if they are being […]

Politico: Inside the White House plan to sell the Iran war online. “The administration’s TikTok-style mash-up videos of missile strikes spliced into movie clips and video games — along with Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s attack-style language at Pentagon press conferences — have gobsmacked those with a more traditional view of how a government should sound during a time of war. But […]

University of British Columbia: ‘I knew it!’—Why misinformation feels so good to share, and what to do about it. “Wes Regan, a PhD candidate and researcher in UBC’s school of community and regional planning, studies polarization, emotion and public decision-making. His work examines how and why misinformation spreads, particularly around urban planning and public policy.”

Radio New Zealand: Pacific broadcasters rethink news delivery in digital age. “With audiences increasing their consumption of online content, many broadcasters say they need to rethink how they deliver news programs. While the opportunities are ever increasing, so too are the challenges for Pacific media to balance credibility and cultural sovereignty.”

BBC: Overseas ‘content farms’ creating political deepfakes uncovered. “Overseas ‘content farms’ are using Artificial Intelligence (AI) to create social media posts about UK politics, an expert has warned. Technology company Meta removed several Vietnam-based pages from Facebook after a BBC Wales investigation found they were spreading fake news.”

Euronews: Spain to launch new tool to measure hate on social media. “Spain aims to introduce a new tool designed to measure hate speech on digital platforms, Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez confirmed on Wednesday, an announcement which comes after he presented a bill to protect minors on the internet this year. This initiative forms part of a broader governmental strategy aimed at enhancing […]