33 GENIUS INTERVIEW Nina Jankowicz
fact remains that in a time of crisis, 59% of people would still look to the BBC as their primary source of information. Looking at the US media environment, you can’t name a single source that 59% of people would go to. Would it be better if it were 80%? Absolutely. But that’s still a staggering statistic. Rebuilding our public media ecosystem is hugely important, and I think this disinformation is filling a vacuum that’s been created by the unfortunate, slow death of the media industry. And I think it’s time that we invest in that, as media as a public good.
I’m not as worried about deepfakes. I don’t think the technology is there to make something extremely convincing, and all we’ve heard about since 2016 is deepfakes. People are aware that they might not be able to trust video. For some reason, that awareness has not carried over to manipulated still images. That’s a place where digital literacy can help, teaching people how to do a reverse image search or look for signs of Photoshopping. I am optimistic about the work that companies like Adobe and Twitter are doing. They’re having in- depth conversations about manipulated media that were not happening four years ago. They’re being proactive in that. I do worry that when everyone starts using encrypted messengers, we’re really going to be screwed. At the moment, encryption is still not important to Americans, but everywhere else I go, everybody is on WhatsApp, or sometimes Telegram or Signal. That’s the next wave. It’s going to be really hard to track what’s happening and definitely harder to fight back.
FEED: What could tech companies be doing differently?
NINA JANKOWICZ: Twitter is going to introduce an interstitial when you retweet something that you haven’t opened below, which I think is brilliant. As someone who writes frequently, I often get people replying to me who have clearly not read the piece. But we still have a problem of scale and business model and the fact that these platforms really aren’t policeable. A lot of the domestic bad actors, who are engaging in things like hate speech, are rapidly getting de-platformed, then moving on to what I call the ‘shadowy basement’ of the internet like 4chan and Gab, where there’s a lot less oversight. Maybe law enforcement agencies are looking at them, but in terms of its direct effect on people in real time, I think we’re missing a lot of what’s going on.
FEED: Closing words?
NINA JANKOWICZ: This is something that we need to have a reckoning with. What is disinformation when it’s coming from inside the house, or when it’s coming from an authentic local voice? Is it still disinformation in the same way? Do we react the same way with our content moderation policies in terms of freedom of speech? Or do people have the right to lie? And if that’s the case, do they have the right to lie at scale? Do they have a right to lie to millions of people and have that amplified across a platform with infinite reach and directly to the people who are going to find it most compelling? I think the answer to that has to be no. Just the same way you don’t have the right to shout “fire” in a crowded theatre, you don’t have the right to threaten public safety, public health and democratic processes. We just have to figure out how to reckon with that question – and then we can solve it.
DO PEOPLE HAVE THE RIGHT TO LIE? AND IF THAT’S THE CASE, DO THEYHAVE THE RIGHT TO LIE AT SCALE?
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