Researchers Validate the Dangers of Disinformation

Disinformation research has come under attack in recent years. Politicians on the right have made unsubstantiated claims on how disinformation research silences conservative viewpoints, while others have argued that misinformation is hard to identify and fact-checking initiatives are too political to be effective.

An article published in the Nature journal Humanities and Social Sciences Communications titled “Liars Know They Are Lying: Differentiating Disinformation from Disagreement" refutes these claims and provides a deep dive into the often-politicized world of disinformation research. The authors argue that willful disinformation (i.e., false claims with the intent to deceit) is “demonstrably harmful to public health, evidence-informed policymaking, and democratic processes.” The authors also propose ways for civil society organizations and policymakers to identify and respond to willful disinformation tactics without resorting to censorship.

This paper supports the idea that disinformation research is essential to democratic discourse. Importantly, this paper also distinguishes between healthy democratic debate based on contested facts and outright lies. As the authors note, disagreeing on facts does not “license the use of outright lies and propaganda to willfully mislead the public,” and it is possible to “identify falsehoods, disinformation, and lies and differentiate them from good-faith political and policy-related argumentation.”

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