America’s Truth Crisis: Using AI to Combat Misinformation

I never found the sci-fi series "Black Mirror" enjoyable TV. The few episodes I watched filled me with existential dread and anxiety (which the show's creators might be happy to hear). Sadly, everyday reality feels more and more like dystopian fiction. We're drowning in a sea of misinformation, much of it spread on a social network controlled by the world's richest man. This isn't a new problem, of course, but it's reaching new levels of absurdity and concern. Just one recent example:

"Yes they [presumably the government?] can control the weather. It's ridiculous for anyone to lie and say it can't be done," Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene wrote on Elon Musk's X (viewed 43.9 million times as of today). Yes, a member of the U.S. Congress actually says Washington is secretly causing or somehow manipulating hurricanes.

"What's happening in America today is something darker than a misinformation crisis," Charlie Warzel recently wrote in The Atlantic. "To watch as real information is overwhelmed by crank theories and public servants battle death threats is to confront two alarming facts: first, that a durable ecosystem exists to ensconce citizens in an alternate reality, and second, that the people consuming and amplifying those lies are not helpless dupes but willing participants."

To be honest with you, my first impulse is to pull the covers over my head and wish it would all go away. How do we fight this? How do we return to a normal information ecosystem where a majority of us believe in the same set of facts, even if we disagree on politics? I'm not sure we'll ever get back to "normal," and concede that a growing number of Americans are never coming back from their "alternative facts" bubbles.

But I believe we can still play a role in bringing the majority of our society back to a place where facts are indeed facts. At Flipboard, our mission has always been to highlight quality journalism and minimize misinformation. We're working harder than ever to inform and inspire users of our app, our website and now throughout the fediverse - always with a facts-first focus.

How are we doing that? The way we always have: by combining world-class technology with seasoned editorial expertise. Our engineers have described the process as an elaborate "layer cake." The ingredients start with a vetted set of publishers that are fed into our artificial intelligence (which we've been using long before the term became en vogue). Of course, an algorithm can't tell the difference between the truth and a lie, so we add the next layer with human data scientists and editors. This team of engineers and editors works to distinguish trustworthy domains from those that deal in misinformation, spam, plagiarism or otherwise offensive content. When we spot bad actors, we take various actions to remove their content. And the team takes steps to rank and recommend quality, accurate content in the algorithm.

Our human editorial team also curates the best content from around the web daily, and partners directly with high-quality publishers such as ABC News, the Associated Press, the BBC, Bloomberg, The Conversation, New Scientist, NPR and ProPublica. This provides quality content directly to our users via our Daily Edition news roundup, email newsletters and push notifications. More importantly, these editorial choices influence the blended algorithm that powers the popular "For You" feed. Our team, all trained journalists with years of experience at trusted media organizations big and small, reads hundreds of stories every day to find the most accurate and current content. In an algorithm-driven world, we will never stop believing in the value of human news judgment.

In response to growing misinformation, we've ramped up our featuring of fact checks from organizations like FactCheck.org, Politifact, the News Literacy Project, and the many journalists who now produce this much needed reality.

Through all of this work, the machine learning team and editorial desks work hand in hand. Our Community Guidelines have an entire section devoted to misinformation, and we take it seriously. We have zero tolerance for content that misrepresents information, altered photos/video, and conspiracy theories. We investigate user reports of alleged violations. Content that violates these rules might be present on the platform since any Flipboard user can flip any article into a Magazine. But if the domain is blocked, our algorithm will not recommend it and we take other steps to prevent these pieces from surfacing. Unlike other platforms, we don't amplify misinformation and overtly biased content.

You will of course find content that leans right and left, but in big topics like #news and #politics, we minimize extreme points of view. As I stated earlier, we believe in bipartisan communication and moving us back to a dialogue based on facts. Flipboard users span the political spectrum and we have no desire to become yet another partisan echo chamber where users aren't exposed to viewpoints they disagree with. But a commitment to factual content remains our primary goal, and we're constantly evaluating whether our media partners are in alignment on that point.

All of this is a work in progress and keeps us on our toes. As fact-checker Bill Adair recently noted, "Lying used to have greater consequences than it does today." That means our war against misinformation and disinformation is more crucial than ever. Fact-finding is in our DNA at Flipboard and it drives our work. As my grandmother said, "When a situation seems impossible, all we can do is try to improve it." It's the trying that's important and what will hopefully make a difference in the long run.

To learn more about Flipboard's long-standing mission, check out these articles:

How Our News Philosophy Supports the Truth

The Truth About Fake News

Detecting Trustworthy Domains

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