Digital Activities Research Articles

An Evaluation of Cyber Threat Taxonomies in the framework of Cyber Activism

The billions of new media platforms available online allow people to represent themselves and meet like-minded people. Thus, a human-based, lively and dynamic public opinion is formed in cyberspace as well. A free and egalitarian representation should be given to all groups in order to ensure the democracy of cyberspace. The states and users who carry the current power struggles to the cyber space restrict cyber democracy. In this study, which is handled within the framework of new media and cyber activism, the motivation of hacktivism, which is a marginal and aggressive type of cyber activism, is accepted as proving its existence and power in the cyber field. DDOS (Distributed Denial of Service)attacks are one of the most preferred attack types by hackers, who are the representatives of the struggle for power and public administration in cyberspace. The aim of the study is to help determine the criteria to distinguish cyber activism from other cybercrimes. The criteria used in DDOS taxonomies are presented in the literature. In order to distinguish cyber activism from other cybercrimes, cyber attacks affecting the public in Turkey were examined and a table containing the messages of hackers and findings were presented. As the result, it has been proposed to include the determining criteria in DDOS taxonomies by making hacktivism motivations visible.

Activism in the Digital Age: The Link Between Social Media Engagement With Black Lives Matter-Relevant Content and Mental Health.

Introduction: Research shows that participation in political activism on social media is linked to psychological stress. Additionally, race-based stress disproportionately affects minorities and is linked to greater psychological symptoms. Yet, the impact of the social media presence of Black Lives Matter (BLM) on mental health has yet to be meaningfully assessed.Methods: This study assessed whether engagement with BLM-related social media vignettes was related to mental health symptoms in two non-clinical samples (total N = 389), using a mixed-methods design. Participants completed an online survey with social media vignettes, self-report inventories of mental health symptoms, and open-ended questions about experiences with and the impact of BLM.Results: Correlations revealed that greater engagement with BLM-related social media posts was related to more severe mental health symptoms. Further, moderation analyses revealed that race significantly moderated the relationship between engagement and anxiety and trauma-related symptoms, such that these relationships were stronger for participants who identified as racial minorities. Qualitative analyses revealed that most participants who were engaged in mental health treatment had not discussed BLM-related topics with their providers, despite many participants reporting disrupted relationships and negative emotions due to exposure to BLM-related social media content.Discussion: Taken together, results suggest that engagement with BLM-related content online is linked to increased mental health symptoms, but these issues are infrequently addressed in treatment. Future research should extend these findings with clinical samples, assess the comfort of therapists in addressing these topics in therapy, and develop interventions to improve mental health in digital activists.

Veganuary and the vegan sausage (t)rolls: conflict and commercial engagement in online climate-diet discourse

Social media platforms have become critical venues for a wide spectrum of influence campaigns, from activism to advertising. Sometimes these two ends overlap and it remains unknown how the latter might impact the former. Situated within contemporary scholarship on vegan activism, this work examines corporate involvement with the Veganuary 2019 campaign on Twitter, as well as the antagonistic backlash it received. We find that the activists and commercial entities engage mostly separate audiences, suggesting that commercial campaigns do little to drive interactions with Veganuary activism. We also discover strong threads of antagonism reflecting the “culture wars" surrounding discussions of veganism and climate-diet science. These findings inform our understanding of the challenges facing climate-diet discourses on social media and motivate further research into the role of commercial agents in online activism.

The Role of Social Media Platforms in Contemporary New Zealand LGBTQ + Movements

This paper explores the shifting dynamics of what constitutes a contemporary social movement and the pros and cons that emerge after movements have gone online. This paper is premised on in-depth interviews with twenty-nine interviewees regarding how social media has brought changes to the contemporary LGBTQ + movement in New Zealand among both Māori and Pākehā (white New Zealanders) communities. The interviewees testified to the shifting nature of the contemporary LGBTQ + movement after the emergence and inclusion of the Internet and social media platforms on movement messaging and participant engagement. This research found that social networking sites have led to greater awareness and better coordination among movement actors to organise LGBTQ + movements in New Zealand (NZ). The paper concludes that the Internet and social media have led to more visibility and acceptability of information within contemporary movements. The Internet was a facilitator of movement organisation even before the emergence of social media platforms; however, online activism has amplified and has taken a new meaning with the advent of several social media platforms.

Palestinian Youth Engagement with Online Political Contents Shared by Citizen Journalists—The Case of Save Sheikh Jarrah

AbstractInitial research on online political activism reveals that new information and communication technologies (ICTs) have increasingly become a growing and supportive space for political participation, which has influenced the conception of political activism. Furthermore, ICTs have become a facilitator for the formation of online political networks and communities. The shocking images of young children killed in the latest genocidal onslaught by Israel against Gaza in 2021 and the clashes that broke out in Sheikh Jarrah and Al Aqsa Mosque dominated the global news and online media platforms. Online political activists, such as Muna El Kurd, who represents the phenomenon of “Citizen Journalism” in Palestine, took to the internet and social media channels to ardently express their discontentment about the unhumanitarian actions and human rights violations being committed. This article aims to map out the Palestinian youth engagement with online political content disseminated by Muna El Kurd' Instagram and Twitter accounts, by employing an empirical approach using a quantitative research method to collect primary data while relying on the literature review to discuss in‐depth online activism and the concept of Citizen Journalism in the Middle East. An online survey, in Arabic language, was conducted following the simple random sampling technique, targeting one hundred college‐educated and technologically advanced Palestinian youth respondents (18–29 years old). The data collected was used to examine and address specific research questions related to what information sources the youth use to acquire political information and to what extent they rely on social media platforms belonging to citizen journalists. The study concluded that Palestinian youth participate in many online activities and rely on social media platforms for information; their interests and knowledge of politics are growing; the surveyed youth in Palestine are highly interested in political matters and are moderate participants in online political discussions.

The Extent of Empathy and Helping Attitudes on Engagement in Clicktivism on Facebook

Clicktivism describes how users on social media support online campaigns. This growing activity is demonstrated on Facebook through its abundant features, including the ability to ‘like’ and ‘share’ share content with family and friends. Importantly factors that may predict the extent to which Clicktivism and online activism are engaged in require further exploration. This current research sought to add to the growing literature by investigating the predictive value of empathy and helping attitudes with engagement in Clicktivism on Facebook. A pre-pandemic UK University student sample of 118 females and 46 males participated in an online questionnaire. This questionnaire consisted of an adapted version of the Facebook Frequency and Use of Activities Scale (FFAS), the Adolescent Measure of Empathy and Sympathy (AMES), the Helping Attitudes Scale (HAS) and the Big Five Inventory (BFI-10). A multiple regression analysis revealed cognitive empathy and sympathy predict engagement in Clicktivism on Facebook. Previous expected predictors such as time spent online and level of Facebook use were interestingly not sufficient to significantly predict Clicktivism.

Signaling silence: Affective and cognitive responses to risks of online activism about corruption in an authoritarian context

Networked authoritarian governments’ use of digital repression creates uncertainty and amplifies risk signals for ordinary citizens using social media for political expression. Employing theoretical frameworks from the risk and decision-making literature, we experimentally examine how citizens perceive and respond to the risks of low-effort forms of online activism in an authoritarian context. Our online field experiment demonstrates that emotional responses to the regime’s risk signals about online activism drive decision-making about contentious online political expression as compared with cognitive appraisal of risk. Moreover, the relationship between anticipatory emotions and contentious online political expression varies significantly depending on individuals’ involvement with the controversial topic of expression. We discuss the importance of emotions and citizen risk judgments for understanding online activism within networked authoritarian contexts.

Evaluation of Polish Adolescents' Knowledge About Human Papillomavirus and Vaccines.

Purpose: Human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccination can prevent more than 90% of cancers caused by HPV. However, they are still not common in Poland. The aim of the study was to evaluate Polish youths' knowledge of HPV vaccine and sexually transmitted diseases (STD). Methods: The cross-sectional study was performed with the use of an anonymous and voluntary survey distributed among 610 graduate high-school students, and 491 (81%) responded. Results: Only 24% were aware of potential oncological risk of HPV infection. Nearly all responders indicated HIV/AIDS as STD, while only 14% indicated HPV as well. In the opinion of 94% participants, vaccines are effective and safe, however, only 8% of girls and 5% of boys claimed that they were vaccinated against HPV. Simultaneously, 43% declared the will to vaccinate their own child in the future. As a barrier in performing HPV vaccinations, participants indicated first of all lack of enough knowledge (64%) and lack of awareness of the need to be vaccinated (51%). The main sources of knowledge about health were internet (93%) and school (67%). Only 10% of the participants had discussed the HPV and vaccine with a doctor. These adolescents had more knowledge about cervical cancer (P = 0.0002) and its relation to HPV infection (P = 0.0001). Conclusions: Polish adolescents present positive attitude toward HPV vaccines but their knowledge is still unsatisfactory. Schools and professional health providers should pay more attention to patient's education as well as developing online campaigns.

Digitally predicting protein localization and manipulating protein activity in fluorescence images using 4D reslicing GAN.

While multi-channel fluorescence microscopy is a vital imaging method in biological studies, the number of channels that can be imaged simultaneously is limited by technical and hardware limitations such as emission spectra cross-talk. One solution is using deep neural networks to model the localization relationship between two proteins so that the localization of one protein can be digitally predicted. Furthermore, the input and predicted localization implicitly reflect the modeled relationship. Accordingly, observing the response of the prediction via manipulating input localization could provide an informative way to analyze the modeled relationships between the input and the predicted proteins. We propose a protein localization prediction (PLP) method using a cGAN named 4D Reslicing Generative Adversarial Network (4DR-GAN) to digitally generate additional channels. 4DR-GAN models the joint probability distribution of input and output proteins by simultaneously incorporating the protein localization signals in four dimensions including space and time. Because protein localization often correlates with protein activation state, based on accurate PLP, we further propose two novel tools: digital activation (DA) and digital inactivation (DI) to digitally activate and inactivate a protein, in order to observing the response of the predicted protein localization. Compared with genetic approaches, these tools allow precise spatial and temporal control. A comprehensive experiment on six pairs of proteins shows that 4DR-GAN achieves higher-quality PLP than Pix2Pix, and the DA and DI responses are consistent with the known protein functions. The proposed PLP method helps simultaneously visualize additional proteins, and the developed DA and DI tools provide guidance to study localization-based protein functions. The open-source code is available at https://github.com/YangJiaoUSA/4DR-GAN. Supplementary data are available at Bioinformatics online.

THE ROLE OF THE INTERNET IN THE POLITICAL SOCIALIZATION OF MODERN RUSSIAN YOUTH

The article analyzes the role of innovative mass media, in particular Internet in the process of political socialization of the Russian youth, taking place in the context of deep socioeconomic and political transformations, globalization and digitalization. The transformational potential of Internet technologies is undeniable today. Political news aggregators, online bloggers, anonymous Telegraph channels present a broad range of political information and opinion. Considering the Internet as a revolutionary means of communication, the authors carried out an analysis of its main characteristics, features of the functioning of institutions of political socialization in the context of digitalization, the role of online activism, digital forms of protest as determinants of political socialization. The importance of an adequate assessment of the role of innovative media in the political socialization of young people, in shaping the political subjectivity of young Russian citizens is obvious.

Rohingya diaspora online: Mapping the spaces of visibility, resistance and transnational identity on social media

This article examines how the Rohingya diaspora employs social media platforms to reclaim their identity narratives through visibility and resistance in the context of genocide and subsequent prolonged displacement. Drawing on qualitative interviews with 15 displaced Rohingya members and activists in Brisbane, Australia, this article demonstrates how transnational digital engagements foreground the construction of the Rohingya diaspora, and subsequently how the transnational identities are negotiated and mediated online. The findings show that the social media platforms facilitated the Rohingya diaspora development and identity construction through building an ‘imagined community’ of resistance, transnational advocacy networks and diasporic media production. At the same time, this article explores how online activism evolved and marginal voices emerged in cyberspace longing for home(land), justice and citizenship rights. This study brings unique insights to understand voices from the margins and shows how new media allow ethnic minorities and marginalised groups to construct diasporic identity through online mediation in transnational spaces.

Social Media and Politics: How Candidates Used Facebook in 2020 Kimanis By-Election

This article explores the ways politicians used Facebook as part of their political campaigns based on postings of Mohamad Alamin and Karim Bujang who contested in the Kimanis 2020 by-election. Throughout the two-week campaigning period from 4 to 17 January 2020, a total of 22 postings related to Kimanis were made by both candidates on their respective pages, evidence that the platform was used as part of their campaigning tools. However, both candidates used the platform differently and the difference is attributed to their familiarity (or lack of) with the platform’s various social buttons. In his usage of these affordances, Mohamad had created an online trail that linked him to prominent politicians who were campaigning for him. These politicians generated 43 Kimanis-related postings on their respective pages. On the other hand, as Karim did not utilize these buttons, there was no online trail that linked him to other politicians in his camp. As for the nature of the postings, both candidates did not use Facebook to raise issues of concern to the voters. Rather, it was utilized to document their offline campaign activities. However, Mohamad certainly benefitted from his online network as the influential politicians generated contents that were important to the voters. This study shows that despite the incorporation of Facebook in the candidates’ political campaigns, it is not fully utilized for active political conversations. Additionally, a familiarity with the social affordances of Facebook could be strategically used to create a more impactful online campaign.

Polarization of Deliberative and Participatory Activists on Social Media

The article demonstrates how social media activism polarizes and clusters into distinct deliberative and participatory arenas, using the case study of online activism for justice for Roman Zadorov in Israel. Zadorov was convicted of murder and sentenced to life in prison. Still, an overwhelming majority of Israelis think he is innocent, with the social media obstruction-of-justice campaign in his support having raised overwhelming exposure and engagement. Theorists distinguish between participatory and deliberative public processes. Supporters of participatory processes advocate for the participation of multiple stakeholders in addressing public concerns. Supporters of deliberative processes advocate for a thorough evaluation of arguments for and against any course of action before decision-making. This study demonstrates how people congregate online and polarize into deliberative and participatory clusters. The “deliberative” cluster is characteristic of groups led by admins who advocate reaching the truth through exposing relevant information and conducting fact-based deliberation. The “participatory” cluster is characteristic of groups led by admins who believe that their activities should aim exclusively at generating more attention and engagement with the general public.

Online information seeking and attitudes towards COVID-19 vaccination in Germany

Abstract Background A large proportion of the European population seeks information about the COVID-19 vaccination on the internet. The population seems to split into those with positive stance on the vaccination and those with negative stance, but there are still individuals who do not have a final position yet. By now, there is a lack of understanding about the online information seeking behavior in these three groups. The current analysis sheds light on differences in internet usage and requested qualities of online information regarding the COVID-19 vaccination. Methods An online survey with N = 1,000 people (18-74 years) living in Germany was conducted between November 26 and December 8, 2021. The questionnaire included closed questions about frequency, information channels, formats and reasons of online information seeking, as well as one open question about requested qualities of online content. We conducted bivariate analysis for differences in information seeking behavior and content analysis for the requests. Results Information seeking behavior differed significantly by attitude towards the vaccination regarding frequency, almost all types of formats, three of ten listed information channels, and three of six reasons for online information seeking. Undecided participants and those who support COVID-19 vaccination used the internet more often than participants who are against the vaccination. Individuals supporting vaccination preferred reading text contributions (e.g. online articles). Informative videos were more often consumed by those who are undecided or against vaccination. Those who have not decided yet preferred online resources providing full information about side-effects and showing reliable facts by credible sources. Conclusions Our findings support an online vaccination communication that is tailored to target groups with different attitudes towards the vaccination. Overall, online campaigns should focus on transparent, reliable and complete information. Key messages • Online information seeking behavior regarding COVID-19 vaccination varies between individuals with different attitudes towards the vaccination. • Online information about the COVID-19 vaccination should focus on transparency and reliable information.

Deconstructing social exclusions: The practice of digital activities among disabled people in China

This study focuses on the experiences of disabled individuals in online activism in the context of China. Adopting the social model of disability, this study found an iceberg structure consisting of two levels and three layers. The explicit level included observed labels, attitudes and legislation. The implicit level involved both social and internalized stereotypes. These three layers of social structures interacted with each other and together brought about social exclusion into being. Adopting the social model as an organizing principle represents a starting point to alter social patterns and possibly change social isolation.

Do — and why do — people interact with politicians on social media? Evidences from Brazilian state level elections

This article presents the results of the analyzes on Facebook campaigning of 140 candidates who ran for governor of the 27 Brazilian federation units during the state level elections. Following Vaccari and Nielsen (2013) analytical framework, we collected the total amount of Facebook posts’ context and interactions of all candidates for governor, to propose an advanced approach of their methodology. We describe the frequency distribution of attention that each candidate generated and use statistical regression to analyze the decisive factors for that amount of attention. In general, the results showed a very active digital campaigning. In the regression model, a competitive candidate and the candidate’s number of press citations were the most predictive factors. The study confirmed the results the previous literature has achieved in other contexts as well.

Populism and social media use: comparing the Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s strategic use of Twitter during the 2014 and the 2019 election campaigns

Populist leaders’ charisma, and their ability to connect directly with the voters, usually via social media platforms, characterize the populist communication style. This study, with its focus on Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s 2014 and 2019 online election campaigns, extends our understanding of how populist leaders change their online communication strategy to seek votes during two different elections. After analyzing and comparing Modi’s tweets from 2014 with his 2019 online campaign, this study demonstrates that Modi, as a first-time contender, employed a key populist strategy of attacking opposition and elites, along with promising economic growth, in 2014. However, as an incumbent in 2019, he primarily used Twitter for self-promotion and to establish a direct connection with voters. While his attacks on opposition reduced significantly, his engagement with the mainstream media increased in the latest elections. This paper also discusses the increasing digitalization and its impact on populist communication.

Friday For Future Strategy in Encouraging Public Awareness Of Climate Change Issues in Germany

The issue of climate change is a global issue that underlies the Friday for Future movement by Greta Thunberg so as to increase the awareness of teenagers in Germany on environmental issues. However, the role of the Friday for Future (FFF) movement is less effective, because the movement is a Global Civil Society that is independent and has no direct connection with the government. This study aims to determine the strategy of the Friday for Future movement in mitigating climate change. The method in this study uses a descriptive type with a qualitative approach. The data used are primary data from questionnaire results and secondary data through library research, data analysis techniques are deductive techniques. The results showed that the FFF movement strategy consisted of four aspects, namely visibility, in the form of direct action taking to the streets on Fridays, listening aspects by speaking directly with the German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas, lobbying aspects by giving advice and to the government through holidays. every Friday, the networking aspect takes the form of actions at several points in Germany to get more youth involved and online campaigns to garner global support.

Who polarizes Twitter? Ideological polarization, partisan groups and strategic networked campaigning on Twitter during the 2017 and 2021 German Federal elections 'Bundestagswahlen'

Political campaign activities are increasingly digital. A crucial part of digital campaigning is communication efforts on social media platforms. As a forum for political discourse and political communication, parties and candidates on Twitter share public messages and aim to attract media attention and persuade voters. Party or prominent candidate hashtags are a central element of the campaign communication strategy since journalists and citizens search for these hashtags to follow the current debate concerning the hashed party or political candidate. Political elites and partisans use social media strategically, e.g., to link their messages to a broader debate, increase the visibility of messages, criticize other parties, or take over their hashtags (hashjacking). This study investigates the cases of the most recent 2017 and 2021 German federal elections called 'Bundestagswahlen'. The investigation (1) identifies communities of partisans in retweet networks in order to analyze the polarization of the most prominent hashtags of parties, 2) assesses the political behavior by partisan groups that amplify messages by political elites in these party networks, and 3) examines the polarization and strategic behavior of the identified partisan groups in the broader election hashtag debates using #BTW17 and #BTW21 as the prominent hashtags of the 2017 and 2021 elections. While in 2017, the far-right party 'Alternative für Deutschland' (AfD) and its partisans are in an isolated community, in 2021, they are part of the same community as the official party accounts of established conservative and liberal parties. This broader polarization may indicate changes in the political ideology of these actors. While the overall activity of political elites and partisans increased between 2017 and 2021, AfD politicians and partisans are more likely to use other party hashtags, which resulted in the polarization of the observed parts of the German political twitter sphere. While in 2017, the AfD polarized German Twitter, 2021 shows a broader division along the classical left–right divide.

Far-Right Digital Activism in Polarized Contexts: A Comparative Analysis of Engagement in Hashtag Wars

Literature on influence operations highlights the coordinated actions of digital activists aimed at persuading audiences. Scholars have discussed many angles of this behavior and emphasized repertoires based on specific contentious actions. However, little is discussed about how these disputes allow us to apprehend different models of political action in polarized contexts. On a whole, studies have not considered a broader understanding of digital activism performed by supporters of far-right governments. How does the far-right spread its agenda and support the government in “hashtag wars”? What kind of strategies are employed? This study seeks to compare patterns of coordinated behavior in hashtags created by supporters and detractors of the Bolsonaro government in Brazil that occupied the trending topics on Twitter. The statistical analysis is based on 6.1 million tweets taken from 20 political hashtags collected over a three-month period from May to July 2020. Data was scraped using Twitter’s Search API v3.0 for academic use. We analyzed the overall volume and peaks of tweets, the users they engaged with, and their network of influence, as well as the length of each hashtag. The results show an intense use of hashtag activism by Bolsonaro supporters, with users struggling for greater prominence in social media in the face of political events in Brazil. This article sheds light on how the far-right appropriates digital platforms to promote the government’s public image in times of political tension and how it promotes coordinated actions aimed at framing social media audiences.