The race to curb the spread of COVID anti-vax propaganda using 2020 election techniques...

[NNadir]

This is from Nature News, probably open sourced: The race to curb the spread of COVID vaccine disinformation,

Subtitle:

Researchers are applying strategies honed during the 2020 US presidential election to track anti-vax propaganda.

Some excerpts:

In March, Twitter put its foot down: users who repeatedly spread false information about COVID-19 vaccines will have their accounts suspended or shut down. It was a new front in a high-stakes battle over misinformation that could help to determine how many people get vaccinated, and how swiftly the pandemic ends.

The battle is also being fought in computer-science and sociology labs across the United States, where scientists who track the spread of false information on social media honed their skills during the US presidential election last year. They are now shifting focus, from false claims that the election was ‘stolen’ to untruths about COVID-19 vaccines. Some surveys suggest that more than one-fifth of people in the United States are opposed to receiving a vaccine.


The epic battle against coronavirus misinformation and conspiracy theories

Researchers are launching projects to track and tag vaccine misinformation and disinformation on social media, as well as collecting massive amounts of data to understand the ways in which misinformation, political rhetoric and public policies all interact to influence vaccine uptake across the United States.

Scientists have identified a wide variety of disinformation surrounding COVID-19 and vaccines, ranging from conspiracy theories that the pandemic was engineered to control society or boost hospital profits, through to claims that the vaccines are risky and unnecessary.

One research consortium, dubbed the Virality Project, is expanding on strategies pioneered during the election to help inform how platforms such as Twitter and Facebook tackle vaccine disinformation. Created by researchers at multiple US institutions — including Stanford University in California, the University of Washington in Seattle and New York University — the team is working with public-health agencies and social-media companies to identify, track and report disinformation that violates their rules...

It does seem like a part of our population has gone insane. It's an interesting, albeit scary question, how and why this happened.

Pic from the article:

[Tommymac]

1. Putin is why it happened.

And is still happening.

The how is easy but complex. The intertubz are like an interstate highway or autobahn - they provide the infrastructure. What is type of 'ride' is driven on it is a whole different enchilada.

Kudos to those fighting this - it is a true CyberWar.