‘Nature’ journal publishes Wolfson GBF on the topic of misinformation sharing on social media

October saw the publication in ‘Nature’ of a paper co-authored by Wolfson Governing Body Fellow Dr Mohsen Mosleh on the subject of “Differences in misinformation sharing can lead to politically asymmetric sanctions”.

The paper explores new research from a team of US and UK researchers (from Oxford, MIT Sloan School of Management, Cornell, and Yale) finding that politically conservative users tend to share misinformation at a greater volume than politically liberal users. This could explain why conservatives were suspended more frequently — thus an asymmetry in sanctions is not evidence of biased policies on the part of social media companies.

The report suggests that the higher quantity of social media policy enforcement (such as account suspensions) for conservative users could be explained by the higher quantity of misinformation shared by those conservative users — and so does not constitute evidence of inherent biases in the policies from social media companies or in the definition of what constitutes misinformation.

With the spread of misinformation an increasing concern, particularly surrounding the recent 2024 US presidential election, the report makes for compelling and essential reading. To learn more about the report, visit the Oxford Internet Institute’s page here.