9. Short Debate: Fake News: How do you spot it, how do you beat it?

Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 5:48 pm on 24 October 2018.

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Ciaran Jenkins: 'In the Philippines and the incredible story of the democratically elected president, Rodrigo Duterte. Thousands of people were killed on the streets of the Philippines, and still are, by vigilante death squads, legitimised by the president himself. And yet, in that country, there was remarkably little public dissent to what was happening, even though more people had been killed under his watch than under the previous dictatorship. It transpired that social media usage in the Philippines is among the highest in the world, and we found people offering paid-for services in which they could set out to undermine a message that someone of influence disagreed with. These were paid-for armies of social media trolls who would attack a rival social media influencer with the purpose of undermining their credibility, to give the impression of resistance to that message and to promote an alternative message, even if that message was extreme or way off the common consensus.'

'You have trolls working for you.'