Just 10 "superspreader" users on Twitter were responsible for more than a third of the misinformation posted over an eight-month period, according to a new report.
In total, 34 per cent of the "low credibility" content posted to the site between January and October of 2020 was created by the 10 users identified by researchers based in the US and UK.
This amounted to more than 815,000 tweets.
Researchers from Indiana University's Observatory on Social Media and the University of Exeter's Department of Computer Science analysed 2,397,388 tweets containing low credibility content, sent by 448,103 users.
More than 70 per cent of posts came from just 1,000 accounts.
So-called "superspreaders" were defined as accounts introducing "content originally published by low credibility or untrustworthy sources".
> Where does low-credibility end, and misinformation begin?
Nowhere. The two are orthogonal.
The cost of ignoring this is amply demonstrated by two examples in latest news, originating in opposite corners of the square. PO Horizon scandal and Google "AI" search overview.
In total, 34 per cent of the "low credibility" content posted to the site between January and October of 2020 was created by the 10 users identified by researchers based in the US and UK.
This amounted to more than 815,000 tweets.
Researchers from Indiana University's Observatory on Social Media and the University of Exeter's Department of Computer Science analysed 2,397,388 tweets containing low credibility content, sent by 448,103 users.
More than 70 per cent of posts came from just 1,000 accounts.
So-called "superspreaders" were defined as accounts introducing "content originally published by low credibility or untrustworthy sources".