How to recognize disinformation and how to stop it | Deb Lavoy | TEDxAtlanta

Deb Lavoy is on a mission to eradicate disinformation. As a former software engineer and digital marketer, she recognized the established social media marketing techniques that disinformation perpetrators appropriating to manipulate us into believing falsehoods. This talk provides tips on recognizing these tricks and how to counter them. Deb Lavoy is on a mission to eradicate disinformation. Her experience in software engineering and marketing, gave her a unique perspective on the rise of disinformation in 2016: the perpetrators were maliciously appropriating tried and tested digital marketing techniques. Deb founded the nonprofit Reality Team in response.
Reality Team drowns out the lies perpetrated over social media with simply stated truths, and arms people with tools and information to join the fight. The organization builds campaigns that change the ratio of truthful to untruthful information on social media feeds and provides tools and techniques to make it easier to tell the difference.
She holds a bachelor’s of science in both computer science and neurobiology. This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at www.ted.com/tedx

[@JohnSmith-gc9yo]

99.9% of tv news fits the subject of this talk... My tv lives in the bottom of a wardrobe now.

[@jasonnehceis3267]

LOL What do you think KZbin is? 🤣

[@karamiddleton2920]

That's the very attitude that makes it certain that you regularly fall for disinformation.

[@comdrive3865]

@@karamiddleton2920 not really. He's just woke that nothing on TV is all that good for the brain, unless it's reruns without ads. At least youtube has some use with ted talks like this. Get the picture?

[@danielfleckenstein7107]

So did she give disinformation by saying that in the art of the deal, chapter 45, it says what she said it says? The art of the deal is only 14 chapters long.....and the passage that she has in the video from the book is a false claim. I googled it.... Ok so I guess I'll finish watching the video and question the rest of it now

[@nathanpowell5941]

Seriously? She used that passage as an example of how SHE fell for disinformation. She made it clear that it was disinformation, that the passage is NOT in the book, and that she was fooled because she was smug and accepted it without checking.

[@disqusmacabre6246]

Ding ding ding! Yes we have we a winner. Nice job of calling her speech out for what it truly was - ...a double serving of dissin'

[@disqusmacabre6246]

As to Reuters be I ng a good source, I sure don't remember them telling me Trump-Russia was hoax originated but HRC. I don't recall Reuters rushing out to tell us the Hunter Biden laptop story was TRUE!(Even though it is now a quite clear

[@jackfrost2978]

@@nathanpowell5941 She never stated why it was false or how she found it to be false.

[@nathanpowell5941]

@jackfrost2978 As the comment you're replying under says, you can determine that quote to be fake with some simple Googling. I'm on the same side of things as the speaker, wanting any quote that makes li'l Donnie look bad to be true. I remember when that thing made the rounds after the election. I too wanted to point at the quote as proof of his plan to foment insurrection. But, I searched online, with a requisite stop at Snopes (and IIRC, Politifact), and quickly learned it was a false quote. I must imagine this speaker did much the same thing. Isn't that how you determine if a given quote is genuine or not?

[@lisanidog8178]

I'm so sick of the word salad descriptions we call misinformation/disinformation! Call it what it is in one word. Lies! When you use that real word you're better able to recognize it for what it is.

[@JacquiChew]

Unfortunately, lies doesn’t always look like lies at face value when “packaged” in a certain way.

[@lisanidog8178]

@@JacquiChew yeah I guess you're right. Lies make me tingle in the back of my neck so I guess I can tell more.

[@comdrive3865]

simple language is apparently a thing of the past. lol

[@lisanidog8178]

@@comdrive3865 LOL! You got that right! Well said!

[@R1GAMBLER]

⚠️ *When you tear out a man's tongue, you are not proving him a liar, you're only telling the world that you fear what he might say.* ⚠️

[@triptych-dialogue]

Great talk! As an artist I am trying to find alternative ways to fight the spread of disinformation. It is isn't easy! I have started posting SHORT ART FILMS that explore the disinformation theme. They are very abstract and not clear and concise as this talk Deb Lavoy. I don't look to offer answers but rather aim to raise questions. I would love your feedback. Your feedback would be most welcome. My channel shows some of the work.

[@diegosilang4823]

Artist are good at creativity and expression (aka lies and disinformation) How I can I trust artist who supports Marxism to be trustworthy?

[@triptych-dialogue]

@@diegosilang4823 I suggest meeting and communicating with a Marxist. (If you are able to find one)

[@otpyrcralphpierre1742]

If you think Elon is wealthy now, wait until he is the only source of information that isn't censored. "I think that one aspect of whatever condition I had (Aspergers) was I was absolutely obsessed with Truth. Just obsessed with Truth ". ~ Elon Musk

[@comdrive3865]

me n elon have some things in common then . but elon is truely too powerful

[@TerrelleCheers1]

Disinformation →Cognitive dissonance

[@Pendaran23]

it took her 10 minutes to say "think about what you read." also, mRNA is able to change genomic DNA, it all depends on what proteins are made from the RNA. So she gave disinformation here too.

[@realityteam7631]

under very specific circumstances large strands of mRNA can interact with DNA - but vaccines don't have long strands or other required factors to make that possible.

[@stevealexander8010]

Well 9minutes in and I find little value. YES - we should be skeptical of ideas when we detect bias, but unlike Ms.Levoy's thesis - it's even more important that we are skeptical when we can't detect bias. ALL ideas deserve equal skepticism. This vid ignores the real topic - HOW to we distinguish information from "disinformation". Advise to be skeptical isn't a formula to "recognize disinformation". First - you cannot rely on any authority. That is an appeal to authority fallacy. The CDC, the EPA, the President, the Pope of Rome - like all humans and human agencies have biases and are fallible. If you want to test a proposed thesis - then YOU must personally consider the quality of the evidence and the logic of the argument that leads from evidence to thesis. Then draw your own CONDITIONAL conclusions. Just as w/ the 'scientific method' you must be prepared to revise your conditional acceptance of any thesis as new evidence appears and new arguments are made. There is no "algorithm for truth", so attempts by social media label/ban "disinformation" are not only very wrong-headed, but they actually cause a worse problem than they attempt to solve. Since there generally is no way to UNconditionally distinguish accurate vs inaccurate theses - therefore these schemes censor some good theses, and promote some bad theses. Many ppl with biases have a HUGE interest in promoting certain false theses for their own benefit. In addition "pre-digesting" arguments and choosing info.vs.disinfo is trying to "think for people" and reduces our ability to consider arguments and evidence fully.

[@jackfrost2978]

1) Train fast brain to notice and pause. Is the information trying to play on emotion. There is a lot of information trying to play on emotion, these days. Does not make it right or wrong. Skepticism is healthy. Including being skeptical of your own bias and beliefs, and those of everyone else. 2) Take a sec to check. This is interesting. Your telling people not to read the or look into the extra information provided. Be like sheep follow the crowd. Including information. Only look at what is popular. I'm sure this has never gone wrong. How is she telling people how to avoid disinformation. And telling everyone to only check popular sources. Don't read or check into potential evidence. 3) Respect your own opinion. ? How is this good advice. First you say don't trust emotion. Then you say trust your emotion. 4) We out number bad actors. Follow the popular opinion. This is trying to reinforce the idea. That the popular opinion has to be the correct opinion. Being skeptical is healthy. When you encounter opposing ideas. You should try to find the best examples. On both sides of a disagreement. Ignore those who attack groups and individuals, instead of focusing on the ideas and information. We all have bias. Set aside bias for the best ideas. When your not sure what to believe with opposing ideas. Don't pick a side. Try to find core parts of the contrary arguments and watch for updates in information from both sides. Popularity of an idea is not a good metric for credibility of that idea. Popular opinions can be popularly wrong. Watching this presentation gave me the opinion. Based on the speakers body language. She did not believe what she is telling people. She is doing propaganda.

[@JacquiChew]

I urge you to Re-watch the talk or read the transcription. Clarifications to your comments: 1) Speaker does not say emotion is bad or good. She does say to pay extra attention when one feels a strong emotion when reading something and take the time to look deeper into the issue, sources, etc. 2) Take a sec to check - contrary to your interpretation, she WANTS us to take a second to check. She goes on to give examples of social media articles where the author is counting on us (the reader) to NOT take a sec to check and take the information at face value. 3) unfortunately, you have taken what she said out of context. Please take a moment to rewatch the talk. I welcome a healthy debate if you still stand by your point number 3. 4) when she talks about “there are more of us” she is referring to the fact that there are more of us who value facts than there are people who want to twist the truth to suit their agenda. If we are mindful and practice the measures put forth as a start, we can counter misinformation.

[@realityteam7631]

@@JacquiChew Thanks for a great reply to this. The whole point here is to recognize that when you have an emotional response, it's time to be more careful, more skeptical. It's easy to get tricked by pseudo logic and pseudo science - so check out who's making what claims and why. Most importantly - don't react, don't believe something shocking or infuriating - or even something really sweet - until you know where it came from.

[@realityteam7631]

oh and as for 3. My intent is to encourage you to respect your need for information. If something is important to you, "you deserve better information than you'll get from a random Facebook post."

[@realityteam7631]

I think that's the point of the pause. to think twice. Be skeptical. Look things up.