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What do we do about “fake news” and other forms of false information: The roles of the organization of false information, professional ethics and information literacy?
Author(s) -
Oltmann Shan M.,
Froehlich Thomas J.,
Agosto Denise E.
Publication year - 2018
Publication title -
proceedings of the association for information science and technology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.193
H-Index - 14
ISSN - 2373-9231
DOI - 10.1002/pra2.2018.14505501091
Subject(s) - disinformation , fake news , information literacy , certainty , information ethics , internet privacy , computer science , public relations , political science , epistemology , world wide web , law , social media , philosophy
False information, of which the most dominant types in the current disinformation marketplace are fake news or disinformation, seems to be ubiquitous these days, with little certainty about how to solve the problems they bring. In this panel, we discuss a taxonomy of types of false information, which will help us better understand the phenomenon and how to address it. We note that simply restricting access to or censoring false information will likely be ineffective and counter to professional information ethics. Instead, the way forward is to promote and practice meaningful information literacy.