Investigating Italian disinformation spreading on Twitter in the context of 2019 European elections.
Journal
PloS one
ISSN: 1932-6203
Titre abrégé: PLoS One
Pays: United States
ID NLM: 101285081
Informations de publication
Date de publication:
2020
2020
Historique:
received:
19
07
2019
accepted:
30
12
2019
entrez:
18
1
2020
pubmed:
18
1
2020
medline:
17
4
2020
Statut:
epublish
Résumé
We investigate the presence (and the influence) of disinformation spreading on online social networks in Italy, in the 5-month period preceding the 2019 European Parliament elections. To this aim we collected a large-scale dataset of tweets associated to thousands of news articles published on Italian disinformation websites. In the observation period, a few outlets accounted for most of the deceptive information circulating on Twitter, which focused on controversial and polarizing topics of debate such as immigration, national safety and (Italian) nationalism. We found evidence of connections between Italian disinformation sources and different disinformation outlets across Europe, U.S. and Russia, featuring similar, even translated, articles in the period before the elections. Overall, the spread of disinformation on Twitter was confined in a limited community, strongly (and explicitly) related to the Italian conservative and far-right political environment, who had a limited impact on online discussions on the up-coming elections.
Identifiants
pubmed: 31951628
doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0227821
pii: PONE-D-19-20362
pmc: PMC6968875
doi:
Types de publication
Journal Article
Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't
Langues
eng
Sous-ensembles de citation
IM
Pagination
e0227821Déclaration de conflit d'intérêts
The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.
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