Tag: COVID-19

Research Publications

This is not a Virus, it's Tyranny: Conspiracy and Partisanship about COVID19 on Canadian Youtube News Channels

This is not a Virus, it's Tyranny: Conspiracy and Partisanship about COVID19 on Canadian Youtube News Channels

Social media platforms have come under increasing scrutiny for spreading mis-and-disinformation about COVID-19. Research has shown that citizens who are misinformed about COVID-19, or who consume highly partisan news about the virus, are less likely to adopt preventative measures, like wearing a mask, and are less likely to get vaccinated against the virus. To understand how Canadian audiences find and discuss COVID-19 news on social media, we examine the structure of Canadian news and information networks on YouTube, the most popular social media platform used by Canadians. We examine the differences across local, national, alternative and “junk” news channels on the platform to explore how audiences watching these channels discuss COVID-19, measuring the extent to which conspiracy and partisanship are a part of Canadian discourse about the Coronavirus on YouTube. We found that most citizens watching news on Canadian YouTube channels used neutral frames, discussing the virus without a conspiratorial or partisan tilt. However, the distribution of neutral comments was not even across the dataset, with 77% of comments on junk news channels representing partisan commentary about the virus. Despite early debunking efforts by health authorities and government officials, many conspiracies about the origin of the virus continued to permeate discussion about COVID-19 in local and national news comments on YouTube.

Authors

Mona Elswah, Mark Robertshaw, Samantha Bradshaw... +1 more
COVID 19Coronavirus+3 more
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Featured Publication: The COVID-19 pandemic and trends in technology (with chapter by Emily Taylor)

Featured Publication: The COVID-19 pandemic and trends in technology (with chapter by Emily Taylor)

Emily's chapter on the UK track and trace app has been published today in Chatham House's 'The COVID-19 pandemic and trends in technology', edited by Joyce Hakmeh. The issues encountered during the development of track-and-trace apps as part of the fight against COVID-19 have highlighted significant differences in levels of accountability and transparency between the public and private sectors. This has underlined the areas of tension between corporate power and the authority of democratically elected governments, and the capacity of tech companies not just to deploy ‘soft’ power in the form of lobbying, but also to block access to essential technologies. The fragmented response to the COVID-19 pandemic has brought renewed focus on the lack of internationally agreed technical standards that are both privacy-respecting and secure by design. Such standards could potentially offer interoperability if individuals travel overseas, while at the same time guarding against overreach by some governments.

Authors

Emily Taylor
Chatham HouseCovid-19+1 more
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Follow the Money: How the Online Advertising Ecosystem Funds COVID-19 Junk News and Disinformation

Follow the Money: How the Online Advertising Ecosystem Funds COVID-19 Junk News and Disinformation

The ecosystem of junk news & disinformation around COVID-19 is enabled by search engines and advertising platforms that contribute to their visibility and financial revenue. Sites that consistently publish junk news, including harmful stories relating to COVID-19, show professional SEO strategies tasked with disseminating their content through search engines. They have high levels of domain authority, meaning that their content will rank high in search results for popular keywords.

Authors

Emily Taylor, Stacie Hoffmann
Oxford Internet InstituteCOVID-19+2 more
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Blog Posts

The COVID-19 Pandemic and Trends in Technology

The COVID-19 Pandemic and Trends in Technology

Emily's chapter on the UK track and trace app has been published today in Chatham House's 'The COVID-19 pandemic and trends in technology', edited by Joyce Hakmeh. The issues encountered during the development of track-and-trace apps as part of the fight against COVID-19 have highlighted significant differences in levels of accountability and transparency between the public and private sectors. This has underlined the areas of tension between corporate power and the authority of democratically elected governments, and the capacity of tech companies not just to deploy ‘soft’ power in the form of lobbying, but also to block access to essential technologies. The fragmented response to the COVID-19 pandemic has brought renewed focus on the lack of internationally agreed technical standards that are both privacy-respecting and secure by design. Such standards could potentially offer interoperability if individuals travel overseas, while at the same time guarding against overreach by some governments.

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