Fake News is a Crime

Fake News is a term often touted and thrown about on social media and in the news. One of United States President Donald Trump’s favorite canned quips is to call someone or something “Fake News” when it does not favor him. With the rise of social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter, the influence of Fake news is becoming more and more relevant. The impact it has on our global society is detrimental. Intentionally writing fake news stories or portraying the news incorrectly to shift public opinion is criminal and should be considered as such.

Fake news stories tell and pushes information that is wrong entirely or at the very least misleading. The issue is that because it is a “News source” people believe what they are reading. Sorting out what sources are wrong can be very difficult today when a new and credible seeming site can appear overnight. Each and every news “source” is selling a different angle on the story. Even credible news sites such as the American news networks Fox News and CNN can and have been caught regularly steering public opinion.

While a news source can and should have opinionated articles and discussions on matters, they should be clearly stated as opinions and not disguised as legitimate news stories. This is often seen with articles that have misleading headlines. In a study conducted by computer scientists at Columbia University and the French National Institute, 59 percent of links shared on social media are never actually opened. This means that the majority of people are sharing and retweeting the “news” without ever actually reading more than the article title. The organizations and groups behind the fake news are aware of information like this and actively take advantage of it.

Being able to correctly identify what is and what isn’t fake news can be a difficult process. Vox, an American news site, recommends the following method to correctly identify fake news from the real thing. frequently read the news, use various sources, understand what you have read and be able to discuss and evaluate it. Following this approach someone can decipher for themselves what is and what isn’t fake news. The trouble is that many people do not do this. Especially since most won’t even read anything more than the headline.

With technology ever improving, it will only get more and more difficult to differentiate between what is and isn’t fake news. Deepfake technology is computer generated images of real life people, coupled with rapidly improving voice generating software, is a scary piece of tech. Deepfakes are capable of showing people in, what looks like real footage, videos saying things that they did not in fact say. It’s potential for the spread of misinformation is incredible. According Giorgio Patrini, the director of a Dutch cyber security firm called Deeptrace, deepfakes that are indistinguishable from the real life thing will become commonplace in the next few years and has the potential to be used to spread vast misinformation.

The world’s government bodies need to act in order to prevent the spread of misinformation. Being caught in the act of clear misdirection or intentional spread of falsified accounts of events should lead to consequences. It is so easy for it to be read shared and taken as fact that the only way to combat it would be to criminalize it.