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An exploratory analysis of COVID bot vs human disinformation dissemination stemming from the Disinformation Dozen on Telegram

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  • Lynnette Hui Xian Ng

    (Carnegie Mellon University)

  • Ian Kloo

    (Carnegie Mellon University)

  • Samantha Clark

    (Carnegie Mellon University)

  • Kathleen M. Carley

    (Carnegie Mellon University)

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic of 2021 led to a worldwide health crisis that was accompanied by an infodemic. A group of 12 social media personalities, dubbed the “Disinformation Dozen”, were identified as key in spreading disinformation regarding the COVID-19 virus, treatments, and vaccines. This study focuses on the spread of disinformation propagated by this group on Telegram, a mobile messaging and social media platform. After segregating users into three groups—the Disinformation Dozen, bots, and humans, we perform an investigation with a dataset of Telegram messages from January to June 2023, comparatively analyzing temporal, topical, and network features. We observe that the Disinformation Dozen are highly involved in the initial dissemination of disinformation but are not the main drivers of the propagation of disinformation. Bot users are extremely active in conversation threads, while human users are active propagators of information, disseminating posts between Telegram channels through the forwarding mechanism.

Suggested Citation

  • Lynnette Hui Xian Ng & Ian Kloo & Samantha Clark & Kathleen M. Carley, 2024. "An exploratory analysis of COVID bot vs human disinformation dissemination stemming from the Disinformation Dozen on Telegram," Journal of Computational Social Science, Springer, vol. 7(1), pages 695-720, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:jcsosc:v:7:y:2024:i:1:d:10.1007_s42001-024-00253-y
    DOI: 10.1007/s42001-024-00253-y
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Cantay Caliskan & Alaz Kilicaslan, 2023. "Varieties of corona news: a cross-national study on the foundations of online misinformation production during the COVID-19 pandemic," Journal of Computational Social Science, Springer, vol. 6(1), pages 191-243, April.
    2. Ahmed Al-Rawi, 2022. "News loopholing: Telegram news as portable alternative media," Journal of Computational Social Science, Springer, vol. 5(1), pages 949-968, May.
    3. Chengcheng Shao & Giovanni Luca Ciampaglia & Onur Varol & Kai-Cheng Yang & Alessandro Flammini & Filippo Menczer, 2018. "The spread of low-credibility content by social bots," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 9(1), pages 1-9, December.
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