In the Cambridge dictionary, fake news is defined as 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. Even though it is not a recent issue, social media has dramatically changed the reach and impact of fake news as a whole. We could cite countless cases to conclude that, historically, the manipulation of information has always been used. That said, we can say with some reason that fake news is not a historical novelty. What is new is the speed and ease of its dissemination. Just by clicking.
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In the 2022 elections, disinformation campaigns displayed unprecedented volume and reach. Allegations that we are experiencing a religious war, that the electoral system is being rigged or that there are reasons for a collective moral panic are some of the disinformation narratives that have dominated the debate —to the detriment of more relevant discussions, focused on objective realities, such as plans for candidates’ government or their performance in previous terms.
The use of fake profiles and accounts, artificial intelligence mechanisms and robots that massively promote deleterious lies gave scale and relevance to the phenomenon, capable of compromising the fairness of individual and collective choices. Fake news can constitute unlawful acts of a civil, electoral and even criminal nature.
Polarization and Political Violence
According to the document “Surviving on the Nets” created by the Internet Lab, the Fernando Henrique Cardoso Foundation and the Monitor of the political debate on the internet, the process of polarizing beliefs goes through a series of mechanisms. Among them, there are the fake news, a tactic of mass disinformation that gained force in our a hyperconnected society. Through social media and automated software, it is easier to enhance mass movements and “polarize”, a recipe for discord. When well performed, results of these mechanisms can cause instability in the democratic process.
Still according to the survey, in addition to emphasizing differences and hiding consensus, polarization of the political debate makes the sides create caricatures of opposing sides. The willingness to understand the arguments that mobilize the members of each pole over the other is very limited – behind the pejorative names, there is a preconceived and simplistic view of the ideologically opposite side. It destroys the possibility of civic dialogue, promoting distrust of those who disagree. Polarization must be distinguished from the conflict of ideas, values and interests, which recognizes the legitimacy of plural and dissident views on the most diverse topics. The acceptance and institutionalization of peaceful conflict resolution mechanisms are among the central characteristics of democratic life.
The research “Partisan Polarization Is the Primary Psychological Motivation behind Political Fake News Sharing on Twitter”, published by the American Political Science Review in August 2021, reveals that an individual’s degree of polarization is the main psychological factor behind sharing fake news. By scraping data from more than 2.4 million tweets from 2,300 Americans, it found that the sharing of fake news has less to do with education and more to do with partisan political convictions and users’ constant quest to vilify and attack their opponents. Individuals who report hating their political opponents are the most likely to share fake political news and selective content useful for attacking political rivals.
It is currently observed how much political polarization has become a negative phenomenon, as it generates feuds between friends, fights between family members, attacks on the press and verbal and physical aggression among citizens. In Brazil, it was possible to perceive a more open movement accentuating such polarization from the political manifestations of 2013, which exposed the dissatisfaction of the population against politics, corruption, and problems in the areas of health and education. Since then, the center as a political spectrum has been going through a process of emptying.
This polarization generated a 400% increase in the number of episodes of political violence in Brazil in the last four years and reached an average of one case every 26 hours in 2022. The data are from a new survey, carried out by non-governmental human rights organizations Justiça Global and Terra de Direitos. In addition, according to the study, a murder or attempt on life through political violence takes place every five days.
Fake News and the 2022 Elections
Wilson Gomes, a doctor in philosophy and professor at the Federal University of Bahia, argues that fake news is not a phenomenon of journalism but of political militancy. In his opinion, it is not by chance that we started hearing about fake news only from 2016 onwards, when two phenomena were consolidated in the world: the unprecedented advance of the digital conservative right and the hyperpolarization of politics. Furthermore, there was no fake news before some transformations related to the new sociability based on digital communications, namely: a) such a wide penetration of the internet, in which virtually everyone is finally online; b) the hyperconnected state we find ourselves in, with everyone online all the time; c) the constitution of fully digital social environments for political coexistence, in which not only information is produced and consumed, but also common representations are constructed and abundant social capital is distributed.
More than a month after the second round of the poll that elected Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT) as Brazil’s next president, groups of people are still camped in front of barracks trying to question the results. With banners, posters, war chants and traffic blockades, supporters of a military coup are motivated by a series of fake news. The backbone of the movement is the idea that the elections were rigged, which has never been proven. Even though many reports, from the Armed Forces and international organizations, stated that no fraud was observed, false information about alleged frauds are constantly shared and motivates the protesters. They also blame the electoral authorities for the results and see them as corrupt, despite the lack of evidence. Therefore, the Superior Electoral Court (TSE) President Alexandre de Moraes is also considered corrupt and an enemy.
Attitudes like these demonstrate the role played by fake news in the 2022 elections. It was an electoral campaign marked by the spread of false information, to the point that the term itself was repeated to exhaustion in the debates. From the announcement that churches would be closed in the event of the election of one of the candidates to the news that there would be a cut in wages and pensions in the event of the election of another. Both sides tried to associate the opponent with everything that could generate rejection among voters, from cannibalism to drug trafficking. According to TSE data, the 2022 election had, compared to the 2020 municipal elections, an increase of 1,671% in the volume of misinformation complaints received through digital platforms.
The rise of fake news, especially in the final stretch of the electoral campaign, led the TSE to edit, on 20 October, Resolution nº 23,714, providing for the confrontation of disinformation that affected the integrity of the electoral process. Through this resolution, the TSE foresaw situations in which contents could be removed from digital platforms; fines could be given for non-compliance (R$ 100,000.00 to R$ 150,000.00 per hour); profiles, accounts or channels on social networks could be suspended.
A study carried out by the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ) points out that the circulation of fake news increased in the second round of elections, compared to the first round. Growth was registered on Telegram (23%), WhatsApp (36%) and Twitter (57%). The daily average of false messages grew from 196,900 before the first round to 311,500 afterwards. According to UFRJ’s NetLab, disinformation structures are increasingly sophisticated and reach not only the bubbles in social networks but spread throughout society even outside the internet.
Threat for Businesses
Even though the debate about fake news is currently focused on the sociopolitical consequences, the destructive potential of this phenomenon goes beyond that and can create a great impact even on huge companies. It can affect one of the most valuable assets a business has, its image.
A survey by the Brazilian Association of Business Communication (Aberje), with professionals from the sector who work or serve large companies in Brazil, showed that 75% of these organizations have already been threatened by fake news that could tarnish their reputation on the market; and that 67% of these companies consider the risk of the organization facing a serious image crisis due to fake news to be high.
In the United States, pharmaceutical company Eli Lilly lost millions of dollars of market value with a 4.3% drop in its shares and irreparable damage to its reputation after someone created an account and, using the new rules introduced on Twitter by Elon Musk, paid the $7.99 to add the verified badge to the new account and impersonate the pharmaceutical company. On this fake account was posted the message: “We are pleased to announce that insulin is now free.” The post racked up nearly 11,000 likes before being suspended. Eli Lilly, this time from its real account, had to deny the information, causing a wave of criticism among users and commentators about the price that the company charges for a medicine that is vital for diabetics.
Eli Lilly is just one of dozens of victims of fake accounts that have proliferated on Twitter since its new owner decided to change the verification rules, causing chaos and confusion within the social network. Among those affected are companies such as Apple, Nintendo and BP, as well as politicians, celebrities and other organizations.
To Aberje, this should be a concern for businesses of all sizes, as false content or misinformation given by a poorly informed spokesperson, for example, can have a major impact on the organization’s image and results. There are ways to combat fake news and prevent the proliferation of false news about organizations on social media, which can seriously put reputations at stake. Based on the numbers shown above, Aberje created a manual with tips for companies. According to the manual, the presence of a company on social networks, in addition to bringing a series of benefits, such as greater reach and increased visibility, can also contribute to the fight against fake news. This is because, if the user knows a brand and its purposes well and has a good relationship with it, when detecting possible false news disseminated, for example, he can promptly act as a defender until the company becomes aware of it and takes the necessary measures.
In their view, it is also important to constantly monitor the networks, in order to prevent false news about a company from being disseminated quickly, such as what happened with Coca Cola, which, according to fake news, should pay more than R$1 billion for stamping the singer’s face Pablo Vittar in his soda cans.
In the case of an already consolidated fake news, a company should find the main source of the attacks, and act in defense through the same channel. It is also important it has information channels on social medias and on its webpage, where it can publish official information. Good relationship with the traditional media is also quite relevant.
Fighting Misinformation
In 2020, a Singaporean opposition politician allegedly used fake news to criticize investments made by the local sovereign wealth fund. Days later, he became the first person in the country to be framed in a new law against fake news. Just like the Asian city-state, 15 other nations on the planet have also created their own legislation in recent years to combat the spread of misinformation on social networks, according to a survey carried out by the Poynter Institute.
The scope and rules of each of these laws, however, vary greatly. In Germany, for example, a project approved in 2017 establishes that social networks with more than 2 million users (which includes platforms such as Facebook and Twitter) have up to 24 hours to remove posts with “obviously illegal” content from the air. The definition includes, for example, threats of crimes or unfounded accusations against a person.
For Cristina Tardáguila, deputy director of International Fact-Checking Network (IFCN) and founder of Agência Lupa, one of the biggest difficulties in this type of legislation is being able to define precisely what fake news is. For the lawyer Björnstjern Baade, who researches the subject at the Free University of Berlin, one of the great challenges of these laws is that they seek to protect the freedom and integrity of democratic speech by restricting it.
In Brazil, bill nº 2.630/2020, better known as the PL das Fake News, is being debated in the Chamber of Deputies and aims to propose measures that, according to the bill, seek to reduce the spread of false news and increase the chances of punishment for those responsible. It also provides for new standards for the operation of search services, social networks and messaging applications.
However, the project is controversial and criticized by practically all the actors involved. Technology companies criticize mechanisms that make it difficult to use users’ data for digital advertising, their main source of income. NGOs, on the other hand, are against parts of the text that extend to social networks the parliamentary immunity of politicians. Furthermore, experts point out that there are ambiguous passages that may go against the initial objective of the law and end up creating an environment conducive to the propagation of “fake news”.
While this project does not move forward, the Superior Electoral Court (TSE) approved a resolution that seeks to speed up the process of removing fake news during the electoral periods. The resolution provided for the TSE to be able to determine that fake news be removed within two hours, the TSE may also suspend channels that publish fake news. Throughout this year, the TSE adopted a series of measures to try to combat fake news. In February, for example, still under the presidency of Minister Luís Roberto Barroso, the court closed a partnership with some social networks. And, throughout the election period, the TSE blocked several fake news propagated by candidates and their supporters.
