Title: How to combat fake news and disinformation
Headings: How to combat fake news and disinformation
How to combat fake news and disinformation
Executive summary
Darrell M. West
Vice President and Director - Governance Studies
Senior Fellow - Center for Technology Innovation
The state of the news media
Figure 1: Where people get online news in the US, 2017
Figure 2: Change in overall news sources, 2012-2017
Figure 3: Use of social media in various regions, 2016
Declining trust in the news media
Figure 4: Public trust in traditional news media, 1997-2016
Challenges facing the digital media landscape
The risks of regulation
Other approaches
Government responsibilities
News industry actions
Technology company responsibilities
Educational institutions
How the public can protect itself
Conclusion
Footnotes

Content: Fake news is generated by outlets that masquerade as actual media sites but promulgate false or misleading accounts designed to deceive the public. When these activities move from sporadic and haphazard to organized and systematic efforts, they become disinformation campaigns with the potential to disrupt campaigns and governance in entire countries. [ 9]
As an illustration, the United States saw apparently organized efforts to disseminate false material in the 2016 presidential election. A Buzzfeed analysis found that the most widely shared fake news stories in 2016 were about “Pope Francis endorsing Donald Trump, Hillary Clinton selling weapons to ISIS, Hillary Clinton being disqualified from holding federal office, and the FBI director receiving millions from the Clinton Foundation.” [ 10] Using a social media assessment, it claimed that the 20 largest fake stories generated 8.7 million shares, reactions, and comments, compared to 7.4 million generated by the top 20 stories from 19 major news sites. When [fake news] activities move from sporadic and haphazard to organized and systematic efforts, they become disinformation campaigns with the potential to disrupt campaigns and governance in entire countries. Fake content was widespread during the presidential campaign. Facebook has estimated that 126 million of its platform users saw articles and posts promulgated by Russian sources. Twitter has found 2,752 accounts established by Russian groups that tweeted 1.4 million times in 2016. [ 11] The widespread nature of these disinformation efforts led Columbia Law School Professor Tim Wu to ask: “