Presentation at "Countering Online Disinformation: Towards a more transparent, trustworthy and accountable digital media ecosystem", hosted by the European Commission, January 29, 2019, Brussels

1. Rasmus Kleis Nielsen
Director, Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism
Countering Online Disinformation: Towards a more
transparent, trustworthy and accountable digital media
ecosystem
European Commission, January 29, 2019
DISINFORMATION —
Public perceptions and
practical responses
@rasmus_kleis
@risj_oxford

2. 2
Q10a_new2017_rc. Which of these was the
MAIN way in which you came across news in
the last week? Base: All/under 35s that used
a gateway to news in the last week: All
markets = 69246/19755.
See Newman et al (2018) 2018 Reuters Institute Digital News Report.
The rise of distributed discovery
All markets

3. Far from creating filter bubbles, distributed discovery
often exposes people to more sources
3
Automated serendipity means that
people who use search and social
media (and news aggregators) tend
to use more sources of news and
greater diversity of sources than
those that don’t
The effect of incidental exposure to
news on social media is particularly
clear for the young and those least
interested in news
See e.g. Fletcher and Nielsen (2018) “Are people incidentally exposed to news on
social media? A comparative analysis,” New Media & Society 20 (7): 2450-2468

4. 4
“IT’S THEIR JOB … TO
REPORT THE FACTS”
Q2. You recently viewed a story with the headline X. On which of the following news websites did you read this story? If you read it on more than one, please
select all that apply. Showing share of correct brand attributions. Base: Direct 1,098/ Search 1,022/ Social 1,008 (Facebook 795, Twitter 194)
2X difference
But brand attribution is a problem …
Fewer than half can remember the news brand that produced a story when
coming from social media or search
See e.g. Kalogeropoulos et al (2018) “News brand attribution in distributed
environments: Do people know where they get their news?,” New Media & Society

5. 5
ALL 37 MARKETS - % THAT TRUST EACH MOST OF THE TIME
Uncertainty in distributed environments, information
unchecked, hard to distinguish news from rumor...
Mostly this about trust in mainstream media
and in the sources that people use
Trust news
I use
44%
Trust news
overall
51%
Trust news
in search
34%
Trust news
in social
23%
See Newman et al (2018) 2018 Reuters Institute Digital News Report.
… as is trust

6. 85%
71% 69% 66% 66% 66% 65% 64% 63% 63% 62% 61% 60% 60% 60% 60% 58% 57% 55% 53% 51% 50% 50% 49% 49% 48% 47% 46% 44% 43% 42% 41% 38% 37% 36% 36%
30%
54%
0%
20%
40%
60%
80%
6
Q_FAKE_NEWS_1. Please indicate your level of agreement with the following statement. “Thinking about online news, I am concerned about what is real and what is fake on the
internet.” Base: Total sample in each market
Brazil
Issue in the elections
Spain
Catalan independence
a flashpoint
Germany
Low level concern
post election
USA
Popularised by Trump
and the media itself
See Newman et al (2018) 2018 Reuters Institute Digital News Report.
Varied concern over whether online news is real or fake

7. See Nielsen and Graves (2017) “’News you don’t believe’: Audience Perspectives
on Fake News”.
Audience perspectives on “fake news”

8. 8
What type of ‘f*ke news’ do people say they are EXPOSED to?
ALL MARKETS
see poor
journalism,
mistakes and
clickbait every
week
42% complain about
spin and agenda-
filled news
39% say they have
been exposed to
completely made
up news
26%
Only
See Newman et al (2018) 2018 Reuters Institute Digital News Report.
Audience definitions of problem are much wider

9. 9
See Newman et al (2018) 2018 Reuters Institute Digital News Report.
Concern versus exposure to types of misinformation etc
Q_FAKE_NEWS_2. To what extent, if at all, are you concerned about the following and Q_FAKE_NEWS_3. In the LAST WEEK which of the following have you personally come across? Please select all that apply.
Base: All markets 2018 – USA: 2401; UK: 2117; Germany: 2038; France: 2006; Italy: 2040; Spain: 2023; Portugal: 2008; Ireland: 2007; Norway: 2027; Sweden: 2016; Finland: 2012; Denmark: 2025; Belgium: 2006; Netherlands: 2010; Switzerland: 2120; Austria: 2010; Hungary: 2005; Slovakia: 2006; Czech
Republic: 2020; Poland: 2005; Romania: 2048; Bulgaria: 2021; Croatia: 2010; Greece: 2014; Turkey:2019; Japan: 2033; Korea: 2010; Taiwan: 1008; Hong Kong: 2016; Malaysia: 2013; Singapore: 2018; Australia: 2026; Canada: 2022; Brazil: 2007; Argentina: 2012; Chile: 2008; Mexico: 2007

10. 10
3. GOVERNMENT
61%
1. PUBLISHERS
75%
2. PLATFORMS
71%
41%60%
“It’s free speech right?
(F, 20-29, USA)
“content is now removed
within a few hours.”
(M, 30–45, Germany)
See Newman et al (2018) 2018 Reuters Institute Digital News Report.
Who bears the biggest responsibility to fix the problems?
Q_FAKE_NEWS_4_2_1-3. Please indicate your agreement with the following statements. Technology companies/media companies/the government should do more to make it easier to separate
what is real and fake on the internet. Base: All with very low/low/high/very high news literacy: Selected markets = 11149/11898/8069/3790.

11. Key points
The move to
distributed
discovery is
demonstrably
expanding people’s
news diets…
… and in many
countries we see
high levels of
concern over what
is real and what is
fake in the news…
… concerns that are
fanned by
politicized use of
the term “f*ke
news” and wide
attention to it and
draw on deep-
seated and much
broader concerns
tied to publishing
and politics …
… but people often
don’t recognize
brands, have low
levels of trust in
news overall, and
especially news in
search and
social…
… concerns that
lead many to see
news media and
politicians as
among those
responsible for
key forms of
what they see as
misinformation.

12. @rasmus_kleis
EUROPE’S FIGHT AGAINST DISINFORMATION
We are still looking for easy wins and clear enemies.
Ideally easy wins that can be delivered via technology, and by technology companies, in a way that
doesn’t cost anything and doesn’t piss anyone off.
That’s a first important step, and we should keep the pressure up, but (a) it ain’t gonna cut it, and (b)
these measures always carry the risk of unintended consequences, including asking already powerful
platform companies to exercise even more power, often on an opaque basis.
And beyond the Russian government’s information operations, clear, agreed-upon enemies are in
short supply – which means that, a year on, we have made little progress especially on two core parts
of the problem: powerful people who lie and bottom-up misinformation spread by ordinary people
acting in good faith.
And so far, most public authorities in Europe have been unable or unwilling to invest in significantly
strengthening the institutions that would increase our societal resilience against these problems,
perhaps because strengthening independent news media and increasing population-wide media
literacy is expensive and slow.
If we continue to be up unable to reach a broad-based consensus on what exactly constitutes
misinformation we may have to accept that it will be politically impossible (and basically illegitimate in
the eyes of the public) to intervene at scale against content, and instead have to focus on (a)
combating truly atrocious and demonstrably harmful activity and (b) enhance our resilience to wider
problems by supporting independent news media and population-wide media literacy.