Too Much Information

Talking to my mum over breakfast, she asked me if the COVID vaccine was suitable for vegetarians because she’d read on Facebook that it contained animal products. No, I responded, exasperatedly preaching the commonly used message ‘don’t believe everything you read on the internet’ yet again.

George Akerlof first argued about asymmetrical information in his paper ‘The Market for ‘Lemons’’, arguing that when consumers do not have access to full correct information to assess the best outcome for themselves, this leads to market failure. Today with the abundance of digital information in circulation it’s difficult to assess what’s fact and fiction, thus we’re left with a sort of political ‘market failure’. How can we as citizens be sure that we’re making the right political decisions when unfounded information is circulated without regulation and ultimately is this leading to our detriment? The Facebook-Cambridge Analytica data scandal in 2018 demonstrated that social media platforms can, for better or worse, have great influence over political decisions and emphasised the imminent need for regulation of digital information and the platforms that this information is circulated on. Despite the need for regulation of digital information, there’s a concern that governments may abuse laws around ‘fake news’ for their own political agenda. The line between preventing the spread of ‘fake news’ and hampering freedom of speech is becoming increasingly blurred, with the rise in legislation restricting the spread of misinformation across the globe.

It’s been demonstrated that governments may not be in the best place to regulate this information. Germany’s Network Enforcement Law (NetzDG) is a law aimed at combating online hate speech which came into force in 2017. It requires social media platforms with over 2 million registered users to remove content deemed ‘clearly illegal’ within 24 hours of being posted. Many countries have taken inspiration from this law and have adopted similar laws into their own jurisdictions despite the criticisms of NetzDG. A report in 2019 by Jacob Mchangama and Joelle Fiss of the Danish think tank ‘Justitia’ found that at least 13 countries have adopted laws similar to Germany’s NetzDG. Founder and director of ‘Justitia’, Jacob Mchangama went on to describe this law as the ‘digital Berlin Wall’ which has accidentally inspired a ‘prototype for global online censorship’.

Inspired by NetzDG, some governments have afforded further powers to themselves. Turkey for example adopted similar legislation to NetzDG, however, their law applies to both social media platforms and news sites. The Turkish law goes even further in allowing the government to remove content themselves, impose excessive fines and even reduce bandwidth for non-compliance by up to 90%, leading to reduced internet traffic to the extent that websites become unusable. There is an undisputed need to regulate media platforms to reduce the spread of misinformation due to the damage it has on the ability of citizens to make informed decisions. However, governments with ulterior intentions may be restricting freedom of speech to push their own political agenda upon citizens.

‘ There is an undisputed need to regulate media platforms to reduce the spread of misinformation due to the damage it has on the ability of citizens to make informed decisions. However, governments with ulterior intentions may be restricting freedom of speech to push their own political agenda upon citizens. ‘

High levels of restriction upon media freedom may also impact the level of political participation of citizens. Professor Peter Leeson examined the relationship between the two in his Paper ‘Media Freedom, Political Knowledge, and Participation’ published in the Journal of Economic Perspectives. His findings demonstrated that ‘low media freedom is strongly associated with poor political knowledge, low political participation, and low voter turnout’. These results show that when governments regulate the media industry more, citizens are more likely to be politically ignorant and apathetic. Therefore, abusing ‘fake news’ laws to restrict the public’s access to information may potentially have negative consequences on citizens’ political knowledge and overall voter turnout, thus, endangering fundamental principles of democracy.

Despite concerns over the impacts of over-regulation, there are problems with leaving media platforms unregulated. Therefore, there is still a need to regulate and reduce the spread of misinformation. A paper published in the journal JMIR Public Health and Surveillance titled ‘COVID-19 misinformation on the internet: The other epidemy’ concluded that ‘by February 6, 2020, no quality information was available on the internet about COVID-19.’ At the end of 2020 the UK Government agreed with Facebook, Twitter and Google a package of measures to tackle vaccine misinformation. These included an agreement that ‘no user or company should directly profit from COVID-19 vaccine mis/disinformation’ and ‘to ensure a timely response to mis/disinformation content flagged to them by the government.’ However, there remains many other media platforms which are largely unregulated and still publishing misinformation.

The line between repressing freedom of speech and appropriate regulation of misinformation is a difficult one to draw. However, there are important principles at stake which makes regulating ‘fake news’ a necessary objective. The question of who is best placed to regulate and how much regulation is necessary remains unknown currently.

Selen Rana Shah