Abstract
Informed by social media data collected following four terror attacks in the UK in 2017, this article delineates a series of “techniques of disinformation” used by different actors to try and influence how the events were publicly defined and understood. By studying the causes and consequences of misleading information following terror attacks, the article contributes empirically to the neglected topic of social reactions to terrorism. It also advances scholarship on the workings of disinforming communications, by focusing on a domain other than political elections, which has been the empirical focus for most studies of disinformation to date. Theoretically, the analysis is framed by drawing an analogy with Gresham Sykes and David Matza's (1957) account of the role of “techniques of neutralization” originally published in the American Sociological Review. The connection being that where they studied deviant behaviour, a similar analytic lens can usefully be applied to disinformation cast as “deviant” information.
Highlights
Disinformation can be defined as “deviant information.” For where information is imparted to enhance awareness, insight, and understanding, disinforming communications blend intent and action to distort, deceive, andBr J Sociol. 2020;00:1–16. | wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/bjos 1 |2INNES dissemble
Informed by empirical data systematically collected by monitoring social media following four terror attacks that took place in the United Kingdom in 2017, the analysis detected a number of distinct “episodes” where false and misleading definitions of the situation were
From a disinformation perspective, both articles were modified the following day to claim that Channel 4 News and other British mainstream media were responsible for misidentifying the Westminster terrorist, effectively attributing the “fake news” to other sources
Summary
Disinformation can be defined as “deviant information.” For where information is imparted to enhance awareness, insight, and understanding, disinforming communications blend intent and action to distort, deceive, andBr J Sociol. 2020;00:1–16. | wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/bjos 1 |2INNES dissemble. This article attends to the aftermath of terror attacks, using this focus to illuminate some broader and deeper patterns in how disinforming messages are constructed and communicated. Informed by empirical data systematically collected by monitoring social media following four terror attacks that took place in the United Kingdom in 2017, the analysis detected a number of distinct “episodes” where false and misleading definitions of the situation were
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