From PBS News
On ‘Settle In,’ Hany Farid and Amna Nawaz discuss spotting manipulated images
By Amna Nawaz
On the latest episode of our video podcast, “Settle In,” Amna Nawaz spoke to pioneering digital forensic expert Hany Farid. They discussed why disinformation spreads online, how to find reliable sources of information and why he’s still hopeful about our digital future.
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Amna Nawaz: We turn now to our PBS video podcast “Settle In.”
For our latest episode, I spoke to pioneering digital forensic expert Hany Farid. We talked about why disinformation spreads online, how to find reliable sources of information, and why he's still hopeful about our digital future.
Hany Farid, University of California, Berkeley: The thing you have to understand about social media is, not only is it -- doesn't care about real, fake, true, lies. In fact, it actually prefers algorithmically the spread of mis- and dis-information because that's what leads to user engagement.
So the algorithms have learned how to spread the most salacious, outrageous conspiratorial content because that's what the billions of people online click on. And so in many ways -- we've known this for a long time -- is that the lies spread much, much faster than the truth, which of course adds a whole 'nother complexity to the speed with which we have to respond and also the consequences for getting it wrong...
Hany Farid is a professor in the Department of Electrical Engineering & Computer Sciences and the School of Information at UC Berkeley
