Fake News Identification for Web Scrapped Data

Majority of the people get affected with misleading stories spread through different posts on social media and forward them assuming that it is a fact. Nowadays, Social media is used as a weapon to create havoc in the society by spreading fake news. Such havoc can be controlled by using machine-learning algorithms. Various methods of machine learning and deep learning techniques are used to identify false stories. There is a need for identification and controlling of fake news posts that have increased in alarming rate. Here we use Passive-Aggressive Classifier for fake news identification. Two datasets, Kaggle fake news dataset and as well as dynamically web scrapped dataset from politifact.com website. We achieved 88.66% accuracy using Passive Aggressive Classifier

What Measures Can Government Institutions in Germany Take Against Digital Disinformation? A Systematic Literature Review and Ethical-Legal Discussion

Disinformation campaigns spread rapidly through social media and can cause serious harm, especially in crisis situations, ranging from confusion about how to act to a loss of trust in government institutions. Therefore, the prevention of digital disinformation campaigns represents an important research topic. However, previous research in the field of information systems focused on the technical possibilities to detect and combat disinformation, while ethical and legal perspectives have been neglected so far. In this article, we synthesize previous information systems literature on disinformation prevention measures and discuss these measures from an ethical and legal perspective. We conclude by proposing questions for future research on the prevention of disinformation campaigns from an IS, ethical, and legal perspective. In doing so, we contribute to a balanced discussion on the prevention of digital disinformation campaigns that equally considers technical, ethical, and legal issues, and encourage increased interdisciplinary collaboration in future research

A UX design project for a transparent news platform

In recent years, fake news has been dominating real news on the Internet. It misleads the public, stirs up and intensifies social conflicts. Online news readers crave the truth than ever. However, it is difficult for them to identify fake news from massive information on the Internet. This paper seeks to help online news readers make more informed and confident judgments on fact-checking by building a transparent news platform. This platform collaborates with news publishers to provide evidence and publish news articles on the desktop software. It also includes a news website which creates an engaging and understandable experience for online news readers to track evidence, obtain detailed information, and make judgments on fact-checking. The conceptual project is based on user experience research. Competitive analysis and literature review are used to find the effective strategy. Content analysis on current fact-checking workflow, and interviews with different users were conducted to discovering the pain points and needs of users. Based on the research result, objectives for the news websites and the desktop software are established. To achieve the goal, information visualization is used to make the appropriate design. Then, usability testing on six online news readers, a journalist, and an editor was conducted to evaluate the project and its impact

Fake news: characterization of different individual profiles in relation to different news topics

Project Work presented as the partial requirement for obtaining a Master's degree in Information Management, specialization in Information Systems and Technologies ManagementThe existence of fake news is an extremely topical concern which calls into question the veracity of the broadcasted information. Since nowadays the search and production of news is mainly done online, the costs with content production are low and the content’s reach and speed of propagation is very high. These factors facilitate the dissemination of fake news in social platforms that are not specialized means of communication, namely in online social networks. Therefore, this study aims to characterize different profiles of Portuguese individuals based on their susceptibility to several news topics. The attainment of the mentioned profiles is going to be a valuable contribution to information management and it is going to allow future definition of measures to mitigate the propagation of fake news in social platforms. To achieve this, critical literature review was done and accompanied by the creation of a survey to analyze how academic background and topic of the news pieces influence the accuracy of individuals identifying false news. This dissertation intents to understand if there is anyone immune to fake news, or if individuals can be more or less immune depending on the topic

Implementation of a multi-approach fake news detector and of a trust management model for news sources

Technological development combined with the evolution of the Internet has made it possible to reach an increasing number of people over the years and given them the opportunity to access information published on the network. The growth in the number of fake news generated daily, combined with the simplicity with which it is possible to share them, has created such a large phenomenon that it has become immediately uncontrollable. Furthermore, the quality with which malicious content is made is increasingly high so even professional experts, such as journalists, have difficulty recognizing which news is fake and which is real. This paper aims to implement an architecture that provides a service to final users that assures the reliability of news providers and the quality of news based on innovative tools. The proposed models take advantage of several Machine Learning approaches for fake news detection tasks and take into account well-known attacks on trust. Finally, the implemented architecture is tested with a well-known dataset and shows how the proposed models can effectively identify fake news and isolate malicious sources

COVID-19 pandemic and the cyberthreat landscape: Research challenges and opportunities

Although cyber technologies benefit our society, there are also some related cybersecurity risks. For example, cybercriminals may exploit vulnerabilities in people, processes, and technologies during trying times, such as the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, to identify opportunities that target vulnerable individuals, organizations (e.g., medical facilities), and systems. In this paper, we examine the various cyberthreats associated with the COVID-19 pandemic. We also determine the attack vectors and surfaces of cyberthreats. Finally, we will discuss and analyze the insights and suggestions generated by different cyberattacks against individuals, organizations, and systems

Literature based Cyber Security Topics: Handbook

Cyber security is the practice of protecting systems, networks, and programs from digital attacks. These cyber attacks are usually aimed at accessing, changing, or destroying sensitive information; extorting money from users; or interrupting normal business processes. Cloud computing has emerged from the legacy data centres. Consequently, threats applicable in legacy system are equally applicable to cloud computing along with emerging new threats that plague only the cloud systems. Traditionally the data centres were hosted on-premises. Hence, control over the data was comparatively easier than handling a cloud system which is borderless and ubiquitous. Threats due to multi-tenancy, access from anywhere, control of cloud, etc. are some examples of why cloud security becomes important. Considering the significance of cloud security, this work is an attempt to understand the existing cloud service and deployment models, and the major threat factors to cloud security that may be critical in cloud environment. It also highlights various methods employed by the attackers to cause the damage. Cyber-attacks are highlighted as well. This work will be profoundly helpful to the industry and researchers in understanding the various cloud specific cyber-attack and enable them to evolve the strategy to counter them more effectively

Cryptographic Tools for Privacy Preservation

Data permeates every aspect of our daily life and it is the backbone of our digitalized society. Smartphones, smartwatches and many more smart devices measure, collect, modify and share data in what is known as the Internet of Things.Often, these devices don’t have enough computation power/storage space thus out-sourcing some aspects of the data management to the Cloud. Outsourcing computation/storage to a third party poses natural questions regarding the security and privacy of the shared sensitive data.Intuitively, Cryptography is a toolset of primitives/protocols of which security prop- erties are formally proven while Privacy typically captures additional social/legislative requirements that relate more to the concept of “trust” between people, “how” data is used and/or “who” has access to data. This thesis separates the concepts by introducing an abstract model that classifies data leaks into different types of breaches. Each class represents a specific requirement/goal related to cryptography, e.g. confidentiality or integrity, or related to privacy, e.g. liability, sensitive data management and more.The thesis contains cryptographic tools designed to provide privacy guarantees for different application scenarios. In more details, the thesis:(a) defines new encryption schemes that provide formal privacy guarantees such as theoretical privacy definitions like Differential Privacy (DP), or concrete privacy-oriented applications covered by existing regulations such as the European General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR);(b) proposes new tools and procedures for providing verifiable computation’s guarantees in concrete scenarios for post-quantum cryptography or generalisation of signature schemes;(c) proposes a methodology for utilising Machine Learning (ML) for analysing the effective security and privacy of a crypto-tool and, dually, proposes a secure primitive that allows computing specific ML algorithm in a privacy-preserving way;(d) provides an alternative protocol for secure communication between two parties, based on the idea of communicating in a periodically timed fashion

FACTS-ON : Fighting Against Counterfeit Truths in Online social Networks : fake news, misinformation and disinformation

L'évolution rapide des réseaux sociaux en ligne (RSO) représente un défi significatif dans l'identification et l'atténuation des fausses informations, incluant les fausses nouvelles, la désinformation et la mésinformation. Cette complexité est amplifiée dans les environnements numériques où les informations sont rapidement diffusées, nécessitant des stratégies sophistiquées pour différencier le contenu authentique du faux. L'un des principaux défis dans la détection automatique de fausses informations est leur présentation réaliste, ressemblant souvent de près aux faits vérifiables. Cela pose de considérables défis aux systèmes d'intelligence artificielle (IA), nécessitant des données supplémentaires de sources externes, telles que des vérifications par des tiers, pour discerner efficacement la vérité. Par conséquent, il y a une évolution technologique continue pour contrer la sophistication croissante des fausses informations, mettant au défi et avançant les capacités de l'IA. En réponse à ces défis, ma thèse introduit le cadre FACTS-ON (Fighting Against Counterfeit Truths in Online Social Networks), une approche complète et systématique pour combattre la désinformation dans les RSO. FACTS-ON intègre une série de systèmes avancés, chacun s'appuyant sur les capacités de son prédécesseur pour améliorer la stratégie globale de détection et d'atténuation des fausses informations. Je commence par présenter le cadre FACTS-ON, qui pose les fondements de ma solution, puis je détaille chaque système au sein du cadre : EXMULF (Explainable Multimodal Content-based Fake News Detection) se concentre sur l'analyse du texte et des images dans les contenus en ligne en utilisant des techniques multimodales avancées, couplées à une IA explicable pour fournir des évaluations transparentes et compréhensibles des fausses informations. En s'appuyant sur les bases d'EXMULF, MythXpose (Multimodal Content and Social Context-based System for Explainable False Information Detection with Personality Prediction) ajoute une couche d'analyse du contexte social en prédisant les traits de personnalité des utilisateurs des RSO, améliorant la détection et les stratégies d'intervention précoce contre la désinformation. ExFake (Explainable False Information Detection Based on Content, Context, and External Evidence) élargit encore le cadre, combinant l'analyse de contenu avec des insights du contexte social et des preuves externes. Il tire parti des données d'organisations de vérification des faits réputées et de comptes officiels, garantissant une approche plus complète et fiable de la détection de la désinformation. La méthodologie sophistiquée d'ExFake évalue non seulement le contenu des publications en ligne, mais prend également en compte le contexte plus large et corrobore les informations avec des sources externes crédibles, offrant ainsi une solution bien arrondie et robuste pour combattre les fausses informations dans les réseaux sociaux en ligne. Complétant le cadre, AFCC (Automated Fact-checkers Consensus and Credibility) traite l'hétérogénéité des évaluations des différentes organisations de vérification des faits. Il standardise ces évaluations et évalue la crédibilité des sources, fournissant une évaluation unifiée et fiable de l'information. Chaque système au sein du cadre FACTS-ON est rigoureusement évalué pour démontrer son efficacité dans la lutte contre la désinformation sur les RSO. Cette thèse détaille le développement, la mise en œuvre et l'évaluation complète de ces systèmes, soulignant leur contribution collective au domaine de la détection des fausses informations. La recherche ne met pas seulement en évidence les capacités actuelles dans la lutte contre la désinformation, mais prépare également le terrain pour de futures avancées dans ce domaine critique d'étude.The rapid evolution of online social networks (OSN) presents a significant challenge in identifying and mitigating false information, which includes Fake News, Disinformation, and Misinformation. This complexity is amplified in digital environments where information is quickly disseminated, requiring sophisticated strategies to differentiate between genuine and false content. One of the primary challenges in automatically detecting false information is its realistic presentation, often closely resembling verifiable facts. This poses considerable challenges for artificial intelligence (AI) systems, necessitating additional data from external sources, such as third-party verifications, to effectively discern the truth. Consequently, there is a continuous technological evolution to counter the growing sophistication of false information, challenging and advancing the capabilities of AI. In response to these challenges, my dissertation introduces the FACTS-ON framework (Fighting Against Counterfeit Truths in Online Social Networks), a comprehensive and systematic approach to combat false information in OSNs. FACTS-ON integrates a series of advanced systems, each building upon the capabilities of its predecessor to enhance the overall strategy for detecting and mitigating false information. I begin by introducing the FACTS-ON framework, which sets the foundation for my solution, and then detail each system within the framework: EXMULF (Explainable Multimodal Content-based Fake News Detection) focuses on analyzing both text and image in online content using advanced multimodal techniques, coupled with explainable AI to provide transparent and understandable assessments of false information. Building upon EXMULF’s foundation, MythXpose (Multimodal Content and Social Context-based System for Explainable False Information Detection with Personality Prediction) adds a layer of social context analysis by predicting the personality traits of OSN users, enhancing the detection and early intervention strategies against false information. ExFake (Explainable False Information Detection Based on Content, Context, and External Evidence) further expands the framework, combining content analysis with insights from social context and external evidence. It leverages data from reputable fact-checking organizations and official social accounts, ensuring a more comprehensive and reliable approach to the detection of false information. ExFake's sophisticated methodology not only evaluates the content of online posts but also considers the broader context and corroborates information with external, credible sources, thereby offering a well-rounded and robust solution for combating false information in online social networks. Completing the framework, AFCC (Automated Fact-checkers Consensus and Credibility) addresses the heterogeneity of ratings from various fact-checking organizations. It standardizes these ratings and assesses the credibility of the sources, providing a unified and trustworthy assessment of information. Each system within the FACTS-ON framework is rigorously evaluated to demonstrate its effectiveness in combating false information on OSN. This dissertation details the development, implementation, and comprehensive evaluation of these systems, highlighting their collective contribution to the field of false information detection. The research not only showcases the current capabilities in addressing false information but also sets the stage for future advancements in this critical area of study