When news broke over the weekend about the surprise Hamas attack on Israel, and Israel’s answering military actions in Gaza, social media feeds quickly filled with accounts of the battle.
Many of the videos uploaded were fake – images from video games, or past fighting, made to look as if they were new ones.
The fakes have proliferated on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter. X has come under intense criticism for its failure to address misinformation, while the Meta-owned Threads platform has gained credibility in the eyes of some.
Tech expert Omar Gallaga says drastic changes to the ways X moderates content, under owner Elon Musk, have made it easier for disinformation to proliferate.
Highlights from this segment:
– Many of the videos posted to X, claiming to come from the current Israel/Palestinian conflict, were actually from earlier conflicts, and even from video games.
– X was once a more reliable source for accurate breaking news information. Today, far fewer journalists post there and moderation of content has been drastically reduced.
– Many journalists have migrated to Threads, which is providing more moderation and tools to help users identify legitimate content.
