EUNOMIA at SOCINFO2020: Challenging Misinformation; Exploring Limits and Approaches

EUNOMIA project joined forces with H2020 project Co-Inform delivering together the workshop “Challenging Misinformation: Exploring Limits and Approaches” at the Social Informatics Conference 2020 (SocInfo2020) on 6th October 2020.

Pinelopi Troullinou (Trilateral Research) and Diotima Bertel (SYNYO) from EUNOMIA project invited researchers and practitioners to reflect on the existing approaches and the limitations of current socio-technical solutions to tackle misinformation. The objective of the workshop was to bring together stakeholders from diverse backgrounds to develop collaborations and synergies towards the common goal of social media users’ empowerment.

Four papers were presented at the workshop; Gautam Kishore Shahi from the University of Duisburg-Essen in Germany discussed the different conspiracy theories related to COVID-19 spread in the web and the challenges of their correction. Furthermore, he delivered a second presentation from his team regarding the impact of fact-checking integrity on public trust. Markus Reiter-Haas from Graz University of Technology and Beate Klosh from the University of Graz, Austria, discussed polarisation in public opinion across different topics of misinformation. Lastly, Alicia Bargar and Amruta Deshpande explored the issue of affordances across different platforms and how this corresponds to different types of vulnerability to misinformation.

The second part of the workshop included a hands-on activity allowing for deeper discussions. A scenario was presented to the participants according to which citizens, journalists and policymakers needed support to distinguish fact from fiction in the context of COVID-19 “infodemic”. Following, they were invited to reflect on the existing best tools and identify their limits. The discussion showed that participants generally referred to two types of tools. Tools that assist users assessing information trustworthiness based on specific characteristics, or that direct them to trustworthy sources, or that provide information cascade (mainly image or film) were brought forward. At the same time, the benefits of tools that enable social media users to think before they share encouraging them to critically engage with information were discussed. The limits of these tools focused on the automation technologies used. Furthermore, it was noted that such tools can still be complex for the average social media users and demand a level of digital literacy.

The last part of the workshop was dedicated to synergies and collaborations among the participants. Potential research project ideas were discussed. Participants also welcomed the invitation to contribute to the EUNOMIA’s edited volume. The book will focus on issues around human and societal factors of misinformation and approaches and limitations of sociotechnical solutions.

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