Credible U: A new project from the Humanity X team

Two-thirds of Americans get at least some of their news from social media, and 14 percent say social media is their "most important" source of information. Unfortunately, a lot of that information is bogus. Tools like social media bots are used to manipulate public opinion by emphasizing or repressing political content and spreading disinformation, hate speech, conspiracy theories, and fake news. All too often, US politicians, wittingly or not, amplify these distortions by sharing the content with their social media followers.

CredibleU is an open-source software prototype that will be launched as the world’s first fake news social media bot. Designed by HumanityX, a group out of Leiden University in the Netherlands, the tool is designed to check the twitter handles of US politicians send out an automatic warning to these individuals whenever they refer to fake news in their tweets. On the assumption that politicians do not necessarily spread fake news on purpose, Credible U favors gentle encouragement over “naming and shaming.” The hope is that it will help politicians during the 2018 mid-term elections to be a credible source for online news sharing.

Humanity X