Introduction

Definitions

Disinformation can be seen as “falsehoods that are spread deliberately” (Bergstrom & West, 2020, p. 29). But perhaps this is a little too broad. Defining it as “dishonest, deliberately deceptive or manipulative communication” (Hameleers & Manifold, 2022, p. 1177) is a little more precise.

But Macnamara goes into even more detail and provides two definitions of disinformation: Citing Derakhshan and Wardle, it is cast as ‘information that is false and deliberately created to harm a person, social group, organisation or country’. And the UK government defines it as ‘the deliberate creation and dissemination of false and/or manipulated information that is intended to deceive and mislead audiences, either for the purposes of causing harm, or for political, personal or financial gain’ (2021, p. 38). The common theme is not just intent, but also harm. This emphasis is underscored in the definition provided by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) — “false or misleading content that can cause specific harm, irrespective of motivations, awareness or behaviours” (Guterres, 2023, p. 5). Disinformation “includes fabricated or manipulated audio/visual content and intentionally created conspiracy theories/rumors. The major motivations behind creating or spreading disinformation are political influence (either foreign or domestic), financial gain, and psychological or social reasons (e.g., to cultivate political cynicism or distrust among people)” (Lee & Jia, 2023, pp. 30-31). Clearly, disinformation is a more serious threat than misinformation (even if it is sometimes difficult to distinguish between them). The United Nations Secretary-General reinforces the gravity of this: “The danger cannot be overstated. Social media-enabled hate speech and disinformation can lead to violence and death” (Guterres, 2023, p. 3).

History

once upon a time …

Varieties

Disinfodemic

Digital Propaganda

While we have a stand-alone unit on “digital propaganda” later on, it is useful to clarify how it is, in fact, a form of disinformation. Robins-Early detailed how misinformation (and questions of foreign influence and fake news sites) occupied the 2016 United States presidential election and conspiracy theories about stealing the election dominated discussion of the 2020 election, but four years later the focus has shifted yet again. This time, disinformation is being reimagined because of the influence of artificial intelligence: “Experts warn that advances in AI have the potential to take the disinformation tactics of the past and breathe new life into them. AI-generated disinformation not only threatens to deceive audiences, but also erode an already embattled information ecosystem by flooding it with inaccuracies and deceptions” (2023). In fact, “there is increasing evidence that AI has been, and will be used to generate realistic deepfakes, create and spread disinformation, and target voters with messages that reinforce harmful, or untruthful messages to a level not seen before” (Kotecha & Simperl, 2024). A 2024 World Economic Forum Survey actually identified misinformation and disinformation from AI as the top global risk over the next two years, ranking it above climate change and war:

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These alarmist narrative warnings (see Altay & Acerbi, 2023) about the oncoming threat of increasingly sophisticated digital manipulation of information able to deceive voters indicates “a sort of democratization and acceleration of propaganda right at a time when several countries enter major election years” (Robins-Early, 2023). Indeed, the term ‘digital propaganda’ is widely understood by scholars as lacking conceptual clarity. While some attempt to define the term, many scholars opt to highlight the lack of understanding and research surrounding the term instead. Because of the complexity of the online digital world, digital propaganda “is often proposed as an umbrella term for a range of affiliated notions and ideas, including ‘post-truth’, ‘fake news’, and disinformation” (Bjola & Papadakis, 2021, p. 189). In the book “The World Information War”, Bjola and Papadakis have a chapter, “Digital Propaganda, Counterpublics, and The Disruption of the Public Sphere”, in which they break down the concept of digital propaganda and attempt to clarify a proper definition of the term as well. The authors looked at both the traditional, information side of propaganda and the more recent and digital side to outline the definition. They used concepts of post truth, fake news and traditional understandings of propaganda on the information side. On the digital side, the authors “look[ed] at the transformative effect of the digital medium on the mechanisms by which disinformation is generated and disseminated” (Bjola & Papdakis, 2021, p. 189). These mechanisms are better understood and defined through Woolley and Howard’s term ‘computational propaganda’, understood as “the use of algorithms, automation and human curation to purposefully manage and distribute misleading information over social media networks” (Bjola & Papdakis, 2021, p. 189). Essentially, the digital side is looking at the technical aspects used digitally like bots or algorithms, that help further spread a propagandic agenda. With the information and digital sides understood and outlined, Bjola and Papadakis define digital propaganda as “the use of digital technologies with the intention to deceive the public through the generation and dissemination of verifiable false or misleading information” (2021, p. 190). In other words, digital propaganda is essentially just the use of digital technological aspects, like bots or algorithms, for propaganda, fake news or disinformation sharing/spreading. While still a bit of an umbrella term for disinformation-related concepts, understanding the two sides (informational and computational) provides a better, more in-depth understanding of the concept. Two varieties of digital disinformation are outlined below. [BC- see reference below]

Memetic Disinformation

Deepfake Disinformation

Deepfakes are a particular kind of digital disinformation. “Deepfakes can be described as visual (e.g. image, video) manipulation using artificial intelligence and deep learning technologies to create fake events (e.g. face swap)” (Lim, 2023, p. 2) Consider the following, now classic, example of a deepfake, meant to alert citizens to the dangers of the technology:

 “Those whose intent is to peddle DeepFakes for particular agenda prey on the ignorance, vulnerability and lack of diligence of the part of unsuspecting and unskilled consumers. By capitalizing on consumers’ media and technological illiteracy, content creators de-educate, exploit and disempower users” (Musa, 2023, p. ix).

Corporate Disinformation

Building on widely understood definitions of disinformation, corporate disinformation has been clarified as “the process of issuing verbal or visual messages with an intent to inform or persuade, including false, inaccurate, imprecise or misleading content, created by the company or on its behalf. The messages may be disseminated by the company itself or by others on its behalf and the disinformation contradicts or distorts the common understanding of verifiable facts affecting the company in order to obtain a benefit. This benefit normally promotes the perception of the company or its reputation, but may also harm competitors” (Olivares-Delgado et al., 2022, p. 542). Note the congruity with strategic bullshit in the emphasis upon obtaining a benefit and the loose relationship with the truth. The particular dysfunction that makes it disinformation, however, is the emphasis upon causing harm. Much of the corporate literature is focused on protecting companies from being the target of disinformation.^[4] We should, however, recognize companies as a source of disinformation. Ranging from subtle (or weak) corporate disinformation to more concerted forms of deception, we might recognize eight types of corporate disinformation: (1) Corporate fake news, (2) Greenwashing, (3) Deceitful Advertising, (4) Misleading Omission, (5) Opacity, (6) Infoxication or information overload, (7) Decontextualized Info and Data, and (8) Illegibility and Inaccessibility (Olivares-Delgado et al., 2022, pp. 542-545).^[5]

References

Bergstrom, C. T., & West, J. D. (2020). Calling bullshit: The art of skepticism in a data-driven world. Random House.

Bjola, C., & Papadakis, K. (2021). Digital Propaganda, Counterpublics, and the Disruption of the Public Sphere. In Clack, T., Johnson, R. (Ed.), The World Information War. (186-213). Routledge.

Fallis, D. (2016). Mis- and dis-information. In L. Floridi (Ed.), The Routledge handbook of philosophy of information (pp. 332-346). Routledge.

Lee, T., & Jia, C. (2023). Curse or Cure? The Role of Algorithm in Promoting or Countering Information Disorder. In M. Filimowicz (Ed.), Information Disorder: Algorithms and Society (pp. 29-45). Routledge.

Lim, W. M. (2023). Fact or fake? The search for truth in an infodemic of disinformation, misinformation, and malinformation with deepfake and fake news. Journal of Strategic Marketing. https://doi.org/10.1080/0965254X.2023.2253805

Ling, C., AbuHilal, I., Blackburn, J., De Cristofaro, E., Zannettou, S., & Stringhini, G. (2021). Dissecting the meme magic: Understanding indicators of virality in image memes. Proceedings of the ACM on human-computer interaction, 5(CSCW1), 1-24.

Macnamara, J. (2021). Challenging post-communication: Beyond focus on a ‘few bad apples’ to multi-level public communication reform. Communication research and practice, 7(1), pp. 35–55. https://doi.org/10.1080/22041451.2021.1876404

McIntosh, E. (2019). Explainer: The rise of Canada’s right-wing meme pages. Canada's National Observer. https://www.nationalobserver.com/2019/10/17/analysis/explainer-rise-canadas-right-wing-meme-pages