Google claims it is stepping up efforts to combat website “misinformation” ahead of the European Union’s legislative elections in June with a new “prebunking” action. The votes in Europe are likely to be a dry run for Google’s attempts to influence the 2024 presidential vote.
Day information that concerns about the potential effects of AI-generated disinformation are rising as the European Union gets ready for its legislative elections in June. In response, software large Google is launching a “prebunking” plan across five European countries, aimed at educating citizens about deceptive techniques used in online propaganda.
Sundar Pichai, CEO of Google and Alphabet, attends a press occasion to proclaim Google as the new standard mate of the Women’s National Team at Google Berlin. Photo: Christoph Soeder/dpa ( Photo by Christoph Soeder/picture alliance via Getty Images )
President Joe Biden speaks at the IBEW Construction and Maintenance Conference, Friday, April 19, 2024, in Washington. ( AP Photo/Alex Brandon )
The action, led by Google’s Jigsaw system, which was founded in 2010 to tackle threats to open cultures, may roll out a series of short animated films in Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, and Poland. These videos may show frequent manipulation methods, such as demonization, fragmentation, and decontextualization, without focusing on specific applicants or parties.
” It works like a vaccine”, says Beth Goldberg, head of research at Jigsaw. ” It helps people to gain emotional threats strategically”. The concept of prebunking, which originated in the 1960s with social psychologist William McGuire’s “inoculation idea”, posits that by exposing citizens to a prescription of deceptive methods, they can become less prone to false stories.
Google’s campaign comes as a result of growing concerns about how Russian propaganda affects election results, which has led the EU to pass a new law mandating tech companies to increase their efforts to combat disinformation. The pre-released ads, which are scheduled to go live in May, will primarily be available on YouTube and Meta platforms, with users being asked to complete a short survey to find out what manipulation methods are used.
Experts caution that prebunking is not a magic bullet, despite the promise it has shown in previous campaigns, with the percentage of people able to correctly identify manipulation techniques increasing by up to five percent after watching a video. Jon Roozenbeek, an assistant professor at King’s College London who collaborated with Jigsaw on prebunking, stresses the value of developing engaging content and managing expectations for behavioral change.
Google’s initiative is not the only example of prebunking in action. The Biden administration has employed a similar approach, dubbed” strategic declassification”, to counter what it claims is disinformation from Russia, China, and Iran by releasing intelligence forecasting potential false narratives.
Read more at TIME here.
For Breitbart News, Lucas Nolan reports on issues involving free speech and online censorship.
