Protecting Yourself From Misinformation Csueastbay Edu

Bonisiwe Shabane

-Dec 5, 2025, 7:45 PM

protecting yourself from misinformation csueastbay edu

Fast-moving news and social media cycles can make it hard to know what information to trust. Here are a few tips to protect your mental health in the current news environment. Don’t worry about following every news alert - when there are big developments, you will hear them. Develop a containing routine that works for you, such as limiting checking the headlines to a few times throughout the day, or muting commercials. Be especially careful about taking in news right before bed, which may disrupt your sleep. Everyone has their own perspective and leaning on issues - this is unavoidable.

Knowing a source’s bias allows you to think critically and make your own choices about what you believe. News outlets, along with everyone else in the world, are sharing their facts, opinions and advice on COVID-19, the illness caused by the novel coronavirus. With the overwhelming information that’s available, how do you know how to sift through and find only what is accurate and necessary to keep you and your community safe? Arizona State University researchers provide a few quick tips to protect yourself from fake or misleading news during this time. “If it's coming through your Twitter, Facebook or Instagram feed, don't think of it as information from those platforms, because it’s not,” said Scott Ruston, a researcher in ASU’s Global Security Initiative. "Ask yourself, 'Who is this coming from and what is the background?' If the article you read makes accusations, ask yourself, 'Who does this benefit?

What’s the underlying source material?' For example, the U.S. Department of State recently identified disinformation campaigns about the coronavirus in Europe," Ruston said. In those cases, strident claims about dangers to residents were made in order to undermine the government. “When someone asks you where you heard something, if your first inclination is to say Twitter, you need to stop and check because Twitter itself tells you nothing,” said Kristy Roschke, co-director of the... Includes Resources, Fact-Checking and Talking To Your Children When we can’t agree on what’s true, we can’t agree on anything.

That’s why misinformation and disinformation (MDI) is so dangerous for our democracy – and why we all have a duty to combat it. In this guide, you’ll learn all about MDI: what it is, how to recognize it, and what to say to loved ones to keep them from falling for it. What Are Misinformation and Disinformation? First, let’s define our terms, misinformation and disinformation, often combined into MDI. Posted June 26, 2024 | Reviewed by Lybi Ma What type of social media user are you?

Mindless scroller or in-depth reader? Do you follow a few carefully selected accounts, chosen for their high-quality posts? Maybe you prefer a more varied newsfeed with posts from lots of different sources—because why wouldn’t you mix funny kitten memes, celebrity gossip, and articles about climate change? Or perhaps your online strategy revolves around following as many other users as possible in the hope that they'd follow you back. After all, this strategy could help to increase your own visibility and reach. Whatever your approach, your interaction with online media will undoubtedly determine what type of information you’re exposed to.

At the same time, it is likely to affect your personal susceptibility to misinformation or "fake news". Falling for online fake news remains a worrying trend that can affect people's responses to socio-political challenges such as pandemics. The number of factors that influence susceptibility to fake news is large and may surprise you. To help categorise these factors and help people consider particular areas of vulnerability, psychologists have proposed a novel framework for online engagement with fake news. According to this framework, there are four separate stages of engagement: (1) source selection, (2) information selection, (3) evaluation and (4) reaction. Source selection: The source selection stage refers to how people create their own online information environment.

This might include strategies described in the introduction of this post like the decisions about the number and type of online accounts to follow. To select their sources, people typically consider information or cues that might signal overlapping interests and provide an idea of people's agendas. The following six action steps can help protect you from misinformation and disinformation. It’s probably not surprising that awareness is the first step in protecting yourself. In order to identify misinformation and disinformation, you first need to know what they are and what they might look like: Also of importance is understanding how these falsehoods can become threats to you, both individually and as a member of a larger society.

Explore the AVID Open Access article, Understanding the Basics of Misinformation and Disinformation, to learn more. This action item also involves awareness. If you are aware of how bad actors are trying to draw you in and manipulate you with disinformation, you can be on the lookout for potential deception. If you don’t know what to look for, it’s very difficult to notice misinformation, and it will be much easier to get fooled. To help you and your students develop the skills needed to identify disinformation, the University of Cambridge Social Decision-Making Lab has developed an interactive learning experience called Bad News. This game-based activity encourages you to take on the role of a disinformation agent in order to raise awareness of their tactics.

Associate Professor of Interdisciplinary Studies, Royal Roads University Researcher, JD Candidate, Royal Roads University Jaigris Hodson receives funding from SSHRC CRC and Connections grant programs. Andrea Galizia does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment. Royal Roads University provides funding as a member of The Conversation CA. In today’s episode, we’ll explore six strategies that you can use to protect yourself—and your students—from misinformation.

For more information about this topic, explore the following AVID Open Access article collection: Become Information and Media Literate. 25800 Carlos Bee Boulevard | Hayward, CA 94542 | 510-885-3000 The term, "Phishing", is used to describe a style of scam conducted over email, where someone poses as a trusted official, administrator, or business, and attempts to gather sensitive information. The concept of phishing has existed for a long time, though the styles of phishing attempts continue to evolve. The most common result of a successful phishing attempt is identity theft. The victim is no longer in control of their email account, and the phisher is able to access the content of the victims' email account and contact list, and possibly other connected applications like...

In addition, if the victim used the same password with other applications and services, the phisher has potentially gained access to those as well. If you accidently send your account credentials via email, immediately change your password by following the steps listed at https://www.csueastbay.edu/netid/. Contact the ITS Service Desk at https://csueastbay.service-now.com/sp to submit a ticket or to speak with a technician. If you receive an email that you believe could be a phishing message, forward it to the Information Security Office at iso@csueastbay.edu. No one from CSU East Bay will ask you for your password. Never give your password to anyone.

CSUEB ITS has received a sharp increase in the number of so-called “display name spoofing” email messages. Display name spoofing is the term used for a phishing attempt that tries to convince the email recipient that the message was sent from a trusted individual (often a co-worker or supervisor) even though... This technique is especially effective against people using mobile devices to access their email, since mobile email clients display less information about the sender than full desktop clients.

Protecting Yourself From Misinformation Csueastbay Edu

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