Fake news is one of the phrases of our generation, with exponents of it manipulating public discourse and prompting considerable efforts to combat its impact.  A new paper from the University of Houston argues that the first step is to better understand how we perceive fake news.

For instance, the team found that in sub-Saharan Africa the public believe they’re highly exposed to fake news, and there is also minimal trust in either the mainstream media or social media.  These findings emerged from a survey of nearly 1,900 people from Kenya, South Africa and Nigeria, with all of the respondents educated middle-class people with access to social media.

The vast majority of respondents thought they were exposed to fake news on a daily basis, especially about politics, with up to 93% of Nigerians and 90% of Kenyans believing this to be so.  The figures match those from a Pew study that found around 71% of Americans thought likewise.

“We found that people in sub-Saharan Africa particularly distrust information on social media, such as Facebook, Twitter and WhatsApp because that’s where they find ‘fake news’ most often,” the authors explain. “Governments are already using this as an excuse to put restrictions on the media by saying that too much freedom of speech on these American platforms poses a ‘danger’ to national security.”

Passing it on

Despite such high numbers reporting being exposed to fake news, a surprisingly high percentage said they also share content they know was made up.  Up to 29% of Kenyans and 25% of South Africans reported doing so.

The authors argue that the prevalence of misinformation prompts people to make poor and uninformed choices.  Indeed, they cite examples from the recent Nigerian elections of people being paid by politicians to spread lies about opponents on social media.  Similar events occurred in the 2016 South African elections, with president Jacob Zuma hiring a firm to create fake Twitter accounts and websites to create racial tension.

“We have thought of these platforms as tools to empower people’s speech, but we’re finding that in certain instances, they are not empowering people,” the authors say. “They are decreasing our ability to make good judgements.”