Social media platforms are primary drivers for the spread of false information. Not only do they maximise the reach and speed by which information is shared, but they may also facilitate and motivate the creation of false information. Mis-and disinformation has the potential to unduly influence attitudes and behaviour, causing people to think and act differently than they would if they were correctly informed.
Leading efforts to mitigate the spread of false information is Director of the NUS Centre for Trusted Internet and Community, and Professor of Computer Science, Professor Lee Mong Li. Prof Lee’s expertise lies in the analysis of semi-structured and spatio-temporal data, and the design of models to understand user behaviour on social networks. User opinions may be influenced by both their social neighbours’ opinions and their own inherent biases.
To better understand a user’s response to false information, Prof Lee has developed an opinion model that captures such fluctuations. She has also designed solutions, like MIST (Minimizing mISinformaTion), to help mitigate the negative influence of misinformation on social media.
In addition, Prof Lee collaborates with Professor Wynne Hsu, Director for Institute of Data Science, to develop frameworks to assess the credibility of claims made on social media, and to innovate solutions that help users gauge the trustworthiness of such claims.
Together with her team of computer scientists, social scientists, and policymakers at CTIC, Prof Lee hopes to design strategies that balance the information processing needs of online users, with their cognitive processing abilities and emotional responses. This will help to ensure users receive a more comprehensive knowledge of issues and empower them to discern mis- or disinformation.
Fact checking tools for online users to be discerning individuals
Empowering consumers to compare and contrast information from multiple perspectives and read more diverse digital information, aiming to attain a balanced and healthier use of digital media platforms
First ever citizens' dialogue to integrate citizens' voice on the development of the Internet through a process of citizen deliberation and participatory democracy on a global scale
Barik, A. M., Hsu, W., & Lee, M. L. (2022, April). Incorporating External Knowledge for Evidence-based Fact Verification. In Companion Proceedings of the Web Conference 2022 (pp. 429-437).
Li, T., Hsu, W., Lee, M. L., & Chieu, H. L. (2020, November). Probabilistic Decision Modeling in Social Networks. In 2020 IEEE 32nd International Conference on Tools with Artificial Intelligence (ICTAI) (pp. 466-473). IEEE.
Saxena, A., Hsu, W., Lee, M. L., Leong Chieu, H., Ng, L., & Teow, L. N. (2020, April). Mitigating misinformation in online social network with top-k debunkers and evolving user opinions. In Companion Proceedings of the Web Conference 2020 (pp. 363-370).
Lim, W. Y., Lee, M. L., & Hsu, W. (2019). End-to-end time-sensitive fact check,”. In ACM SIGIR Workshop on Reducing Online Misinformation Exposure (ROME).
Poddar, L., Hsu, W., Lee, M. L., & Subramaniyam, S. (2018, November). Predicting stances in twitter conversations for detecting veracity of rumors: A neural approach. In 2018 IEEE 30th International Conference on Tools with Artificial Intelligence (ICTAI) (pp. 65-72). IEEE.
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