Part 1 of 5 Ways You can Fight Disinformation this Election Season

As we move on to the next stage of “Election Season”, it’s more important than ever to guard against disinformation. False information can prevent people from voting, cast doubt on the credibility of the election process, and potentially even be used as the basis for a coup attempt.

So it’s up to all of us to fight back against disinformation.

As Shireen Mitchell says, if you have an immediate reaction to share a link without verifying or fact-checking, you need to pause and look at things differently. One of the goals of disinformation is to get you to react emotionally. …

Part 2 of 5 Ways to Fight Disinformation this Election Season

As we move on to the next stage of “Election Season”, it’s more important than ever to guard against disinformation. False information can prevent people from voting, cast doubt on the credibility of the election process, and potentially even be used as the basis for a coup attempt.

So it’s up to all of us to fight back against disinformation.

This short video from PEN America, Shireen Mitchell’s All of us have been targeted by disinformation, and Jen Soriano’s Disinformation is like a virus, are all great two-minute introductions to what you can do about disinformation. …

Part 3 of 5 Ways You can Fight Disinformation this Election Season

As we move on to the next stage of “Election Season”, it’s more important than ever to guard against disinformation. False information can prevent people from voting, cast doubt on the credibility of the election process, and potentially even be used as the basis for a coup attempt.

So it’s up to all of us to fight back against disinformation.

Part 4 of 5 Ways You can Fight Disinformation this Election Season

One of the biggest challenges about disinformation is that it often flies below the radar — making it hard to respond. So when you see disinformation, report it! Here’s a few ways:

ReportDisinfo.org is an easy-to-use site to report disinformation, run by Common Cause Election Fund. You can include a link to the web page, or upload an image.

Stop Digital Voter Suppression is the place to report digital voter suppression. Also consider reporting voting-related disinformation to your state and local election officials.

Social network sites all provide ways to report disinformation. The World Health Organization has a page with links for how to report on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, WhatsApp, TikTok and other sites. The more people who report a post, the more likely it is that companies will fact-check it and potentially take it down. …

Part 5of 5 Ways You can Fight Disinformation this Election Season

As we move on to the next stage of “Election Season”, it’s more important than ever to guard against disinformation. False information can prevent people from voting, cast doubt on the credibility of the election process, and potentially even be used as the basis for a coup attempt.

So it’s up to all of us to fight back against disinformation.

As Kate Starbird and her research team at University of Washington pointed out a few years ago, producing disinformation is a collaborative process. And so is fighting back!

Fortunately, there are more and more grassroots projects where people work together as a team to monitor and respond to disinformation. Here’s a…

As we move on to the next stage of “Election Season”, it’s more important than ever to guard against disinformation. False information can prevent people from voting, cast doubt on the credibility of the election process, and potentially even be used as the basis for a coup attempt.

So it’s up to all of us to fight back against disinformation.

Here’s five things you can do.

1. THINK before you engage or share
2. EDUCATE yourself — and your friends and family
3. SHARE accurate information about the election
4. REPORT disinformation when you see it
5. JOIN a grassroots disinfo-fighting campaign

Each of the links goes to a post with more details. Or if you prefer, read on and get all the details here! …

MediaJustice and the Disinfo Defense League are kicking off their Week of Action Against Disinformation with the #DisruptDisinfo Twitter Block Party Monday October 26 at 1 PM Pacific, 4PM Eastern. It’s a great chance to learn how to respond when people share disinformation — and how to avoid sharing disinformation yourself.

Whether or not you’re on Twitter, you can follow along here.

The Disinfo Defense League is a group of non-partisan non-profits and researchers, and they’ve got a lot of other great events planned as part of the week of action. A few highlights:

• Canaries in the Coal Mine: Racialized Disinformation in the Digital Age: featureing experts from United We Dream, UltraViolet, Asian-Americans Advancing Justice and Stop Online Violence Against Women. Wednesday 10/28 at 11 p.m. Pacific (2 p.m. …

Summary: In the early 2000s, Microsoft faced challenges similar to the ones Zoom’s looking at today, and successfully turned things around. Some of the key lessons from Microsoft’s experiences include

• Think broadly about “trust”
• Make trust the product teams’ responsibility
• Fix your privacy practices and policies
• Do threat modeling
• Use the tools — and develop new ones
• Learn from your experiences
• It’s a social problem, not just “technical”
• It may take a while to address — but there’s a big potential upside

The Twitter thread includes a longer summary and some discussion.

A tough time for Zoom

After a great start to the year, with usage soaring as people around the world stay home, the last few weeks have been a really tough time for Zoom. The company has always focused on convenience and usability. Now, they’re dealing with the consequences of not having paid much attention to security and…