Latest news with #CCDH
Yahoo
9 hours ago
- Yahoo
X Tests New Process To Reduce Political Division
This story was originally published on Social Media Today. To receive daily news and insights, subscribe to our free daily Social Media Today newsletter. You have to give credit where credit's due: While I don't believe that X's Community Notes approach is an effective way to combat the spread of misinformation in the app (at least as a sole measure, outside of internally-staffed moderation), I do respect that the Community Notes development team is continually working to implement new updates to address key concerns with the Notes system. Today, X's Community Notes team has announced a new experiment that will highlight content which sees agreement from users of differing political perspectives, in the hopes of reducing division and angst in the app. As you can see in this example, X will soon begin showing some users (Community Notes contributors to start with) prompts in the lower segment of some X posts that have been liked by people from opposing sides of the political spectrum. And if you tap through on the 'What do you think?' text, you'll be able to give the X team more insight as to what you like, or don't, about that specific post, which could help X address common elements of division on content. As explained by X: 'A subset of Community Notes contributors - representing a wide range of viewpoints - will occasionally see a new callout in the product. The callout shows based on early and limited Like signals on the post. Contributors will then be able to rate and provide more feedback about the post, helping to develop an open source algorithm that could effectively identify posts liked by people from different perspectives.' X says that these ratings won't affect a post's reach or visibility, but that: 'Depending on insights and feedback from the pilot test, it is possible that in the future, ratings could help spotlight posts that are liked by people who normally disagree.' Why is that important? Because political disagreement is a key flaw within the Community Notes system, with Community Notes only being displayed in the app when Notes assessors of differing political perspectives agree that a note is warranted. It's this proviso that's led to many, many Community Notes never being shown, to anybody, despite these posts often including blatant misinformation. Indeed, according to analysis conducted by the Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH) last year, 73% of submitted Community Notes relating to political topics are never displayed on X, despite them often providing valuable context, while another study conducted earlier this year by Spanish fact-checking site Maldita found that 85% of all Community Notes are never displayed to X users for the same reason. On some issues, users are never going to agree, and those often relate to divisive misinformation about hot-button political issues. That's worsened in the current landscape, where even the U.S. President is prone to amplifying questionable claims. As such, Community Notes often fails to keep people informed of relevant context, because people don't agree on the need for such on certain points. But maybe, if X is able to showcase more cases of agreement, that will ease disputes, and get people to view things in a more objective way. I mean, it seems unlikely that Republican and Democrat aligned voters are ever going to agree that the 2020 U.S. Election was manipulated or not, no matter evidence is produced, but maybe, if X can build more community alignment into the system, by showcasing such to respective users, that could at least open more conversation around more topics, as opposed to siloing people into their own echo chambers. It's worth a shot, and it's a fairly simple measure, at this stage, to better demonstrate relative agreement. And if X can somehow dilute this aspect, and ensure more relevant, valuable Community Notes are displayed in the app, that could be a big step forward in ensuring greater protection for X users.
Spectator
2 days ago
- Politics
- Spectator
Should we be above cancelling the cancellers?
I've been mulling over Marco Rubio's latest salvo in the Trump administration's assault on the Censorship-Industrial Complex. The US Secretary of State has announced he'll impose visa bans on foreign nationals judged to be censoring US citizens or US tech companies. And according to one news report, the ban will apply to their family members too. So who might be on this blacklist? Rubio hasn't named names, but I can think of a few candidates. Imran Ahmed, the CEO of the Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH)would be hard-pressed to deny his pro-censorship lobby group targets US citizens and US tech companies, because 'Centre' is spelt C-E-N-T-E-R, though the company was set up in the UK. To underline this, the Disinformation Chronicle published what purported to be a leaked internal CCDH document last year declaring that its strategic priority was to 'kill Musk's Twitter'. Ahmed, a British citizen, lives in Washington DC. Awkward. What about Morgan McSweeney? Sir Keir's chief of staff was the founder of the CCDH and only resigned in April 2020 after the organisation had launched a campaign against the spread of 'online misinformation' about Covid-19. Prior to that, it published a 'Don't Feed the Trolls' report, endorsed by Gary Lineker. (Isn't he a troll?) It recommended reporting 'trolls' to the social media companies that publish their posts, which sounds awfully like encouraging censorship, bearing in mind the CCDH's definition of a 'troll' is pretty broad. 'They don't want to 'win' or 'lose' an argument; they just want their ideas to be heard by as many potential converts as possible,' said the report.
Yahoo
19-05-2025
- Yahoo
Incel extremism doubles online amid Adolescence backlash
Incel extremism groups online have nearly doubled their membership amid a backlash against the Netflix hit show Adolescence. The largest active online incel platform has increased in size to 30,000 members from 17,000 in September 2022, according to research by the Centre for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH). The platform received a peak of more than 2.7 million visits in the first quarter of this year, with posts reflecting the misogynistic, racist and anti-Semitic tendencies of participants. The forum is the online home for thousands of involuntary celibates or incels, who often express hostility to women and wider society, blaming them for their lack of sexual and romantic experiences. In an analysis by the CCDH of more than 650 posts from the forum's discussion threads, researchers found that one in four contained misogynist hate, racism or anti-Semitic conspiracies. A majority of posts expressed disapproval of the Netflix series, with forum members claiming the show's central character was too attractive to be an incel, or that the show's writers had failed to distinguish the subculture from misogynist influencers such as Andrew Tate. Adolescence became Netflix's third most-watched English language show in its history. It follows a teenager who delves into online misogynist communities before murdering a female classmate. In its research, CCDH found that forum members posted about rape every 29 minutes, while 16 per cent of posts contained a misogynistic slur. Researchers also noted that the volume of posts on the forum had grown over time to reach a daily average of 2,340 posts. Imran Ahmed, CCDH's chief executive, warned that Incel ideology on the internet had grown and was not restricted to the dark web. 'The misogyny and extremism we saw three years ago have not only intensified, they've multiplied,' he said. 'Incel communities, where young men and boys are encouraged to hate and hurt women, are not hidden in the deepest recesses of the dark web – these communities of tens of thousands of men are operating in front of our children's eyes, accessible in the browsers of their cell phones. 'I encourage parents and schools to have deeper conversations with their children that span beyond the fictional show of Adolescence and into the reality of radicalisation facing young boys. 'This is an immediate crisis that demands more research and urgent action from policymakers, tech companies, and parents.' Broaden your horizons with award-winning British journalism. Try The Telegraph free for 1 month with unlimited access to our award-winning website, exclusive app, money-saving offers and more.
Telegraph
19-05-2025
- Telegraph
Incel extremism doubles online amid Adolescence backlash
Incel extremism groups online have nearly doubled their membership amid a backlash against the Netflix hit show Adolescence. The largest active online incel platform has increased in size to 30,000 members from 17,000 in September 2022, according to research by the Centre for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH). The platform received a peak of more than 2.7 million visits in the first quarter of this year, with posts reflecting the misogynistic, racist and anti-Semitic tendencies of participants. The forum is the online home for thousands of involuntary celibates or incels, who often express hostility to women and wider society, blaming them for their lack of sexual and romantic experiences. In an analysis by the CCDH of more than 650 posts from the forum's discussion threads, researchers found that one in four contained misogynist hate, racism or anti-Semitic conspiracies. A majority of posts expressed disapproval of the Netflix series, with forum members claiming the show's central character was too attractive to be an incel, or that the show's writers had failed to distinguish the subculture from misogynist influencers such as Andrew Tate. Adolescence became Netflix's third most-watched English language show in its history. It follows a teenager who delves into online misogynist communities before murdering a female classmate. In its research, CCDH found that forum members posted about rape every 29 minutes, while 16 per cent of posts contained a misogynistic slur. Researchers also noted that the volume of posts on the forum had grown over time to reach a daily average of 2,340 posts. Imran Ahmed, CCDH's chief executive, warned that Incel ideology on the internet had grown and was not restricted to the dark web. 'The misogyny and extremism we saw three years ago have not only intensified, they've multiplied,' he said. 'Incel communities, where young men and boys are encouraged to hate and hurt women, are not hidden in the deepest recesses of the dark web – these communities of tens of thousands of men are operating in front of our children's eyes, accessible in the browsers of their cell phones. 'I encourage parents and schools to have deeper conversations with their children that span beyond the fictional show of Adolescence and into the reality of radicalisation facing young boys. 'This is an immediate crisis that demands more research and urgent action from policymakers, tech companies, and parents.'
Yahoo
13-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
X's Community Notes Reaches 1 Million Contributors
This story was originally published on Social Media Today. To receive daily news and insights, subscribe to our free daily Social Media Today newsletter. While it's not perfect, and it remains a contentious element for a range of reasons, X's Community Notes program continues to expand, with a million X users now actively contributing to its Notes submission and approval process. That's a lot of community input, which is crucial to the effective operation of the Community Notes model, while as you can see in the clip above, X is also touting the fact that both Meta and TikTok have also moved to implement similar Community Notes-style approaches to complement their own moderation systems. Which means that Community Notes is a success, right? The fact that these other platforms are taking cues from X suggests that X's model is working, and is driving better outcomes overall. Right? Well… Among the various changes implemented at X under Elon Musk, Community Notes is largely considered to be among the most successful, ushering in a new approach to content moderation that enables X's user base to decide what should be allowed to be published, and what should be restricted, as opposed to leaving that decision up to management. That ideally addresses a key concern in owner bias, and Musk has repeatedly accused previous Twitter management of using such for their own purpose. Conceptually, this makes sense. Instead of Musk and Co. deciding what's acceptable and what's not, and what should be corrected or left unchallenged, the X community now does this, doing away with more heavy-handed monitoring and restriction by X's own moderation team. Having a million contributors also reduces the labor load that X needs to pay external contractors for, so ideally, this system both empowers the community, and reduces costs, improving the X experience overall. But that's not always how it's playing out. For example, according to analysis conducted by the Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH) last year, 73% of Community Notes related to political topics are never displayed on X, despite these notes providing valuable context. As you can see, based on the CCDH's analysis, Community Notes should have been displayed on various posts about political topics to provide important context, but because X contributors couldn't agree on whether a note was needed, those markers were never displayed in the app. Which is a key flaw, and while both X and Meta have repeatedly pointed to studies which show that Community Notes can reduce the spread of misleading posts by more than 60%, while user-generated annotations are perceived as significantly more trustworthy than simple misinformation flags, these statements are only relevant when a note is actually displayed in the first place. And most Community Notes on X are not displayed. Another study conducted earlier this year by Spanish fact-checking site Maldita found that 85% of all Community Notes are never displayed to X users, due largely to the fact that Notes are only shown when there is agreement that a Note is necessary between contributors of opposing political backgrounds. Add to this the fact that X's Community Notes system has also been infiltrated by organized groups of contributors who collaborate to up and downvote notes, and you can see how this system is not foolproof, and is enabling certain elements of misinformation to proliferate on X. To be fair, X's Community Notes team has continued to improve the system, including in addressing concerns with turnaround times, in order to ensure that Community Notes are displayed on posts before they can have a broad impact. The Community Notes process is getting better, but the need for political agreement, and the fact that it can be manipulated by mobs, does point to significant concern within the broader notes approach. And now Meta's rolling it out, to a 5x bigger audience than X has. Don't get me wrong, there is definite value in Community Notes, and the fact that there are now a million Notes contributors on X is significant. But it should be used as a complement to third-party fact-checking and internal moderation tools, not a replacement. Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
