Stockholm den 7 april 2017, klockan 14:59: rapporter om en lastbil som körde på människor längs Drottninggatan i centrala Stockholm, nådde allmänheten. Det konstaterades snabbt vara en terrorattack. Kort efter attacken började uppgifter om skottlossning på olika platser runt Stockholm att spridas. Ryktena cirkulerade i drygt en timme innan polisen kunde dementera dem, efter att ha avsatt resurser för att undersöka de påstådda skjutningarna. Skottlossning hade aldrig inträffat.             Studiens syfte var att undersöka retoriska dimensioner och persuasiva funktioner hos fake news samt vilka konsekvenser fake news kan få vid en krissituation. Visuell retorisk analys var den metodologiska utgångspunkten som, genom en abduktiv forskningsstrategi, kombinerades med teoretiska perspektiv för kris, ethos, vividness och fake news. Analysmaterialet utgjordes av fyra nyhetsutdrag: SvT Nyheter, Dagens Nyheter (2 st.) och Expressen var källorna bakom dessa.             Analysen visade att nyheterna om skottlossning mottogs som visuella intryck, som i kombination med starka ethos och högt förtroende för nyhetskällorna, utgjorde trovärdiga nyheter som allmänheten accepterade som sanna. Därtill konkluderades att fake news kan förstås som mentala bilder. / Stockholm, 7th of April 2017, 2:59 pm, reports said a lorry had hit several people along the pedestrian street Drottninggatan in the city centre, which was quickly labelled a terrorist attack. Shortly afterwards, news flashes warned people of alleged open gunfire observed at several other spots in the city. The rumours circulated for over one hour before the Police were able to refute them, after firstly having investigated the claims themselves. There had been no shootings.          The purpose of this study was to explore the rhetorical dimensions and persuasive functions of fake news and which consequences these can lead to in a crisis. Visual rhetorical analysis has been the methodological approach which, through an abductive research strategy, was combined with the theoretical perspectives of crisis, ethos, vividness and fake news. The material analysed consisted of four news excerpts: SvT Nyheter, Dagens Nyheter (2) and Expressen.             The analysis showed that the news of the alleged gunfire were perceived as visual impressions which, in combination with strong ethos and high trust for the source of news, were deemed as credible and therefore true by the readers. In addition, it was concluded that fake news can be understood as mental pictures.

As so called fake news spread widely on the internet it is important to examine how they are spread, and thereby, how much of a problem they are. This thesis investigates how the spread of news articles on Twitter can be represented via a tree structure, as well as whether or not the trees have patterns that correlate to attributes such as the source of the shared news article and how many followers the original tweeter has. As part of the study a tool was built in Python 2.7 that, amongst other things, allows tracking and reconstruction of a news article's propagation on Twitter.It could be concluded that most links that are shared on Twitter propagate over a period of a few days and most retweets are made within the first twelve hours. We observe patterns suggesting that having more followers correlates to getting more retweets. Users who have few followers have to rely on their tweets being retweeted in a longer chain of users for it to reach a larger audience. Tweets that have a substantial spread often spread widely, but not especially deep. Finally, our results suggest that both the news site that created the article and the content of the article has an impact on how much it is retweeted.

Fake news har fått ett starkt fäste i sociala medier och är ett växande problem – för individen såväl som för samhället. Grundläggande teorier om beslutsfattande, samarbete, kommunikation och marknader bygger alla på en bärande idé om att information är sann, precis och samvetsgrann. Det finns starka både ideologiska och ekonomiska motiv bakom spridningen av felaktiga fakta, falska berättelser, lögner och konspirationsteorier. Det råder en uttalad oro över effekten på politiska val och den demokratiska utvecklingen, men också farhågor om andra potentiella negativa konsekvenser, från ökande cynism och apati till hetsande extremism. Åtgärder för att minska utbredningen diskuteras, i litteraturen framträder fyra olika huvudformer: statliga interventioner, självpåtagna begränsningar/plattformspolicys, teknologiska lösningar och utbildning i källkritik. Civilsamhällets roll i begränsningen av spridningen är, såvitt kunnat överblickas, tidigare inte studerad. Denna explorativa studie syftar till att öka kännedomen om det svenska civilsamhällets mobilisering mot fake news. De aktörer som identifierats i studien är för civilsamhället karaktäristiska frivilligorganisationer som dels agerat självständigt, dels i samarbete med offentlig sektor och/eller näringslivet. Samtliga aktörer har haft mobiliseringen mot fake news som en biuppgift, det vill säga det har inte varit deras enda eller deras huvuduppgift. I studien har fem huvudstrategier framträtt i mobiliseringen mot fake news: grundläggande utbildning och undervisning, allmänbildande kompetenshöjning, understödjande, skapa debatt och påverkansarbete. Angreppssättet har varit kvalitativ innehållsanalys. / Fake news has gained a strong foothold in social media and is a growing problem - for the individual as well as for the whole society. Basic theories of decision making, cooperation, communication and markets are all based on the idea that information is true, accurate and conscientious. There are strong both ideological and economic motives behind the spread of false facts, false stories, lies and conspiracy theories. There is a deep concern about the effect this may have on political elections and democratic developments, but also concerns about other potential negative consequences, from increasing cynicism and apathy to instigative extremism. Measures to reduce dissemination are discussed and the literature shows four different main forms: government intervention, self-imposed measures/platform policies, technology solutions and source criticism training. The role of civil society in limiting the spread is, as far as it could be established by the author, not studied previously. This exploratory study aims to raise awareness about the Swedish civil society's mobilization against fake news. The actors identified in the study are civil society voluntary organizations who acted independently, or in cooperation with the public sector and/or business sector. All actors have mobilized against fake news as a secondary task, that is, it has not been their sole or their main task. In the study, five main strategies have emerged in the mobilization: basic education and training, general education enhancement, supporting, creating debate and impact work. The methodological approach in this study has been qualitative content analysis.

Made available in DSpace on 2015-05-07T14:46:46Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 arquivototal.pdf: 2082746 bytes, checksum: fd3ac1bd6cddb86f5e450ae7748408ae (MD5) Previous issue date: 2014-03-26 / Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior / The current research intends to take a look at the impact of the social interactions made by the intermediation of the computer thru the virtual community called, Web Novels Fake on Orkut. This work also investigated the reasons for individuals to interact as fake profile in such a social network. The proposal of such dissertation intends to contribute to the study of communication, and quotidian life in its interdisciplinary method with sociology as well. Therefore, this investigation was made possible through the phenomenon of computer-mediated interactions. This research followed three distinct methods of investigation in order to provide an overview; a) It presents the fake profiles as a subjective representation anonymous; b) The Web-novel is presented as an expression of such interactions mediated by the computer, and c) Everyday life as a sweeping of social phenomena in postmodernism. As a result of these approaches, all of the methods of investigation were distributed throughout the four chapters of this dissertation. The methodological approach was done through socialization and symbolic interactionism. Maffesoli‟s comprehensive sociology helps one to understand the relationships between the fake profiles, and its interpretation of the interactions with the profiles in the context of such virtual community according to Goffman. As one may noticed, the empirical study of the fake profile and its methodological feature investigated how interactions mediated by computer arose in daily life, and also how these interactions could be interpreted, and what were their impact on society. Thus, the analysis was done in two distinct moments. In the first one, five fake profiles were interviewed, and the authors of this web-novel within their community in order to analyze how they would interpret the interaction processes in the context of their community "Web-novels fake." In a second instant, five "key ideas" were categorized, and accordingly such data were collected accordingly to observation of the interaction between the readers profile and the author profile as well in a web-novel, which is already in progress. Such a web novel is called the Rented Boyfriend". In conclusion, it is obvious that there is an attempt to escape reality, or even a need for attention for oneself. One may also presuppose the young people who belong to this anonymous group to be likely to make a scapegoat of it. As a result of this analysis, one must observe such interactions as a new type of conversational approach of those whose fake can talk, construct ideas, stimulate dialogue, and promote discussions as well. / A presente pesquisa buscou lançar um olhar sobre o impacto das interações sociais pela mediação do computador através da comunidade virtual Web novelas fake , do Orkut. O porquê de um indivíduo interagir como perfil fake, também foi investigado. Com efeito, esta proposta de estudos visa contribuir para o estudo da comunicação e o cotidiano na interdisciplinaridade com a sociologia, a partir da investigação do fenômeno das interações mediadas pelo computador. Nessa direção, organizamos esta pesquisa por três veios temáticos, na busca de um panorama geral: a) o dos perfis fake como representações subjetivas anônimas; b) o da webnovela, como expressão dessas interações mediadas pelo computador e c) o do cotidiano como abarcador de fenômenos sociais na pós-modernidade, todos distribuídos nos quatro capítulos da dissertação. A abordagem metodológica é pela socialidade e o interacionismo simbólico. Aquela, a partir da sociologia compreensiva em Michel Maffesoli, que visa compreender as relações entre os perfis fake e essa, que objetiva interpretar as interações dos perfis no contexto desta comunidade virtual, em Erving Goffman. A partir do estudo empírico, enquanto recurso metodológico, investigamos como as interações mediadas pelo computador são problematizadas no cotidiano, como essas podem ser interpretadas e qual o impacto dessas na sociedade. Para tanto, a análise se deu em dois momentos. No primeiro, entrevistamos cinco perfis fake, autores de webnovelas na comunidade, para analisar como esses interpretam os processos de interação no contexto da comunidade Web novelas fake , corpus da pesquisa. Em um segundo momento, catalogamos cinco ideias-chave , a partir de dados coletados através da observação da interação entre os perfis leitores e o perfil autor de uma webnovela em andamento, a Rented Boyfriend . Por fim, consideramos que além das interações entre perfis fake perpassarem o escapismo, a fuga da realidade ou a necessidade de chamar atenção, entendemos que esses jovens os quais pertencem a esse agrupamento anônimo buscam uma válvula de escape para criar e interagir; para viverem. Portanto, observamos essas interações como uma nova abordagem conversacional cujo fake fala, constrói narrativas, estimula diálogos e promove conversações.

[pt] A internet se tornou um vasto terreno de pesquisa e fonte de informação e também uma poderosa ferramenta de lucrativa desinformação e propaganda. Silverman (2016) verificou que três meses antes das eleições americanas de 2016, as 20 informações falsas mais compartilhadas somaram um total de 8.711.00 de compartilhamentos em contraponto às 20 notícias mais compartilhadas publicadas por jornais como The New York Times, NBC News e outros, que tiveram 7.367.00 compartilhamentos. Segundo o Índice Global de Desinformação (GDI, na sigla em inglês) a desinformação é um mercado de pelo menos 235 milhões de dólares em publicidade online. É o que estima estudo de 2019, que acompanha o alcance e os efeitos da desinformação no mundo. Esta é a receita estimada dos 20 mil sites de diversos países classificados como desinformadores pelo GDI. Essa receita com publicidade foi auferida por meio de uma tecnologia chamada propaganda computacional ou mídia programática, que automatiza leilões de espaços publicitários em sites em tempo real. O presente trabalho procura, a partir do método dialético de Marx, tecer considerações sobre desinformação, esclarecendo termos como fake news, pós-verdade, misinformation e disinformation para compreender os impactos do fenômeno e buscar compreender a quem interessa desinformar. Compreendemos que a desinformação, em muitos casos, tem o objetivo de trazer lucro a quem a dissemina. Com base no estudo publicado pelo Oxford Internet Institute, da Universidade Oxford, procuramos mensurar a lucratividade dos sites de desinformação brasileiros, indicados pelo site jornalístico independente de verificação de fatos Aos fatos, e utilizando a mesma plataforma de gestão de visibilidade online, SemRush, que o instituto usou para mensurar os dados, e comparamos com sites de jornalismo de referência (Aguiar, 2018). Dissertamos também sobre a legislação que começa a ser construída no Brasil em relação à desinformação. / [en] The Internet has become a vast field of research and source of information and also a powerful tool of lucrative disinformation and propaganda. Silverman (2016) found that three months before the 2016 American elections, the 20 most shared false information totaled a total of 8,711,00 shares in contrast to the 7,367,00 shares of the 20 news articles published by newspapers like The New York Times, NBC News and others. According to the Global Disinformation Index (GDI), disinformation is a market of at least 235 million dollars in online advertising. This is what the 2019 study estimates, which follows the reach and effects of disinformation in the world. This is the estimated revenue of the 20,000 sites classified as uninformed by the GDI. This advertising revenue was earned through a technology called computer advertising or programmatic media that automates auctioning of advertising space on websites in real time. The present work seeks, from Marx s dialectical method, to weave considerations about misinformation, clarifying terms such as fake news, post-truth, misinformation and disinformation to understand the impacts of the phenomenon and seek to understand who is interested in misinformation. We understand that disinformation, in many cases, aims to bring profit to those who disseminate it. Based on the study published by the Oxford Internet Institute of Oxford University, we seek to measure the profitability of Brazilian disinformation sites, indicated in the article of the independent journalistic fact-checking website, To the facts, and using the same online visibility management platform, Semrush, that the Institute measured the data and comparing with reference journalism sites (Aguiar, 2018). We also discuss the legislation that is beginning to be built in Brazil in relation to disinformation.

My diploma work is focused on topic of environmental responsibility, priviledge of mobility, nomadism, borders and dreaming of utopic un/realities. In site-specific instalation I combine sound, video, painting and text.

The thesis follows up a topic of fake news within the borders of Czech Republic. This frequently discussed phenomena is often linked to the pro-Kremlin propaganda, whose aim is to evoke fear across the citizens, as well as raise distrust towards reigning authorities, western institutions, a functionality of liberal democracy and at last but not least - distrust towards public media and mainstream media in general. This is being achieved by production of fake news, also known as fictive, false or manipulative articles, that are being spread through the social media. Despite its low credibility the news often make their way into the public discussion, forming the general opinion and as a result affecting many political decisions. In order to follow this topic up further, I will put in use the Adam Klein's concept, also known as information laundering.This concept describes the ways how these hateful articles, personal opinions and straight up false news are getting legitimised within the online world and subsequently spread through the social media under the disguise of respectable journalism. The thesis is aiming to map out the entire sphere of fake news media, its websites and Facebook and YouTube social profiles as well as describe individual aspects of the entire mechanism using quantitative analysis. In...

(in English): The thesis deals with the exploration of the possible influence of so-called sleeper effect in perception of fake news for teenagers. In the first part this thesis explains the historical and research context of both sleeper and the illusory truth effect, which also served as an inspiration for research design, and this part also describes the type of news and the present state of news trushworthiness in the Czech republic. The theoretical part also describes the basic methods of quantitative research and statistical analysis that are later on applied in the practical part of the thesis, which mainly includes the final data analysis and the repeated research that went on during May and June 2019 at 6 chosen schools.

Digitaliseringens ständiga utveckling inom samhället och verksamheter har lett till nya fenomen och förutsättningar vilket har medfört nya utmaningar. Desinformation är ett avdessa begrepp som har fått allt större betydelse inom det digitala samhället som finns idag. Begreppet som har uppmärksammats alltmer syftar till missvisande, felaktig och falskutformad information. Desinformation blir allt vanligare och det problemområde som identifierats är hur verksamheter hanterar existensen av desinformation. Därmed strävade studien mot att svara på frågeställningen: Vilka tillvägagångssätt har verksamheter för att hantera desinformation i sin användning av digital teknik? Studien genomfördes med en kvalitativ forsknings- och metodansats som syftar till att skapa förståelse kring begreppet desinformation, dess bakomliggande faktorer samt vilka tillvägagångssätt verksamheter använder sig av samt hanteringen av begreppet för att minska risken av dess konsekvenser. Datainsamling genomfördes genom en intervjustudie med sju verksamheter samt fem stycken fokusgruppsintervjuer. Resultatet från datainsamlingen påvisade att det finns en bred definition kring betydelsen av desinformation samt att det inom verksamheterna inte finns någon uttalad strategi eller tillvägagångssätt för att hantera desinformation. Det upplevdes finnas tillräckligt med stort förtroende för medarbetarnas egna ansvar i att agera källkritiskt. Befintlig litteratur identifierar att det finns svårigheter kring att upptäcka om informationen är sann eller inte men även att den mänskliga faktorn har betydelse för bedömningen av informationen. Även individens tidigare erfarenheter har betydelse. Det som däremot framkom som studiens slutsats var att följande faktorer var en del av verksamhetens tillvägagångssätt för att avgöra trovärdigheten i information: arbeta med kända aktörer och källor, agera källkritiskt, avgränsa hur intern information hanteras inom verksamheten och bedöma utseende av informationen såsom grammatik och språkbruk. / The digitalization’s constant development in society and in businesses has led to new phenomena and concepts that have not previously existed, which have caused problems. Misinformation is a new concept that has gotten a greater meaning with the digital society that exists today. Misinformation has received increasing attention and refers to misleading, incorrect and falsely designed information. The problem area that is identified is how companies handle the existence of misinformation. The purpose of the study was to answer the research question: What approaches do businesses apply to handle misinformation in their use of digital technology? The study was conducted with a qualitative research and method approach that aims to create an understanding of the concept of misinformation, its underlying factors and what approaches business use when dealing with misinformation to reduce the risk of its consequences. Data collection was conducted through an interview study with seven businesses and five focus group interviews. The results from the data collection showed that there is a broad definition of misinformation and that there is no stated strategy or approach within the operations to deal with misinformation. It was identified that there was enough confidence in the employee's own responsibility in acting source critical. Existing literature identifies that there are difficulties in discovering whether the information is true or not. The human factor has meaning and whether the information is in line with the individual’s opinions. The study's conclusion was that the following factors were a part of the business's approach to determining credibility in information: working with well-known sources, acting with source criticism, defining how information is handled within the business and assessing the appearance of the information such as grammar and language usage.

Comparative case study consists of 12 chapters and is composed as qualitative research. The main goal of the study is to research the fake news used in chosen set of data, consisting of 13 television debates. The case study works with two cases - the presidential election in the Czech Republic (2018) and in Slovakia (2019). First part of the analysis deals with methodology and theoretical background for fake news and role of television debates in election campaign. Next part is dedicated to the analyzed cases of elections, briefly covering the development of the election campaign followed by analysis. The results of the analysis are summed up in the independent chapter. As the most used fake news themes in given debates the analysis identifies following: migration, negative attitude towards media, questionable funding of the campaign and attempts to influence the elections. The main difference in the cases is the nature of the competition, when the acting president is running for re-election. Keywords: Fake news, desinformation, president, elections, campaign, television debate, Miloš Zeman, Jiří Drahoš, Zuzana Čaputová, Maroš Šefčovič