Social Media Regulation Research Articles

Social media use in children and young adults: the Malta experience

Abstract Prof. Jean Calleja Agius MD PhD is Professor at Faculty of Medicine and Surgery at the University of Malta. Jean will demonstrate further examples of interventions to make the internet safer for young people, drawing on her experience of collaborating with the Children and Youth Council within the Malta Foundation for the Wellbeing of Society (MFWS), which in turn is affiliated with EUROCHILD. She will share the outcomes of initiatives which have been carried out within MFWS and outline recommendations made directly by children and adolescents. More stringent regulation of social media companies will be addressed, as well as the need for other measures to engage children in other healthier activities and empower them to opt for the right choices.

Online safety and social media regulation in Australia: eSafety Commissioner v X Corp

ABSTRACT This article discusses the issue of online safety and the regulation of social media, examining first, some key theoretical perspectives on social media regulation, transparency, legitimacy and corporate regulation; second, Australian legal responses to the issue of online safety, including the Online Safety Act, legislation to curb abhorrent violent material and violent extremist material, and the eSafety Commissioner v X Corp case; and third, evolving technology-based strategies to regulation: self-regulation systems and user verification. The challenges and complexities that arise in the context of social media are emblematic of the much wider challenges facing both technology regulation and society around the world.

Mapping the space of social media regulation

Social media platforms mediate a significant fraction of human communication and attention. The impact of social media on society has been under increased scrutiny, and concerns over its effects have motivated varied and sometimes contradictory government regulation around the world. In this review article, we offer two ways of mapping the space of social media regulation: viewing social media either (i) as an architecture impacted by design choices, or (ii) as a market governed by incentives. We survey the most prominent regulatory approaches globally (both enacted and proposed), with an emphasis on the United States and the European Union, and position these options within the two maps. We conclude by discussing the fundamental trade-offs associated with different interventions, comparing jurisdictions, and highlighting paths forward in the context of the potentially-conflicting rights and interests of relevant stakeholders.

Book notes: Digital and Social Media Regulation: A Comparative Perspective of the US and Europe by Sorin Adam Matei, Franck Rebillard and Fabrice Rochelandet (Editors)

Book notes: <i>Digital and Social Media Regulation: A Comparative Perspective of the US and Europe</i> by Sorin Adam Matei, Franck Rebillard and Fabrice Rochelandet (Editors)

Social media regulation in Uganda: the dilemma of laxity and conformity to international norms

ABSTRACT The proliferation of social media use has resulted in the quest for standards and norms relating to internet governance. Uganda has gradually instituted laws, occasionally shut down the internet and levied taxes to regulate social media use. Initially, the norms and standards resulted from negative consequences of social media use, such as hate speech, incitement, and misinformation. However, the regime has used this pretext to curtail collective voices, dissent, and freedom of expression that social media use brings into the political arena. The dilemma in the international system is that social media regulation has taken a new twist as different countries adopt what they feel is appropriate. Drawing from the primary and secondary data sources, it can be concluded that the Ugandan regime has used social media regulation to keep political dissent, incitement, and protests in check, and states such as Uganda get support from big actors that are proponents of legal frameworks and internet sovereignty.

"Pinocchio had a Nose, You have a Network!": On Characterizing Fake News Spreaders on Arabic Social Media

The detection and analysis of fake news and its origins has become a main task associated with the overall objective of social media regulation in recent years. The majority of work has been dedicated towards detecting misinformation with some focus on analyzing the flow of fake news across social networks. However, there is less attention to the characteristics of social media users who consume this fake news. In this work, we investigate the possibility of predicting users' reactions towards fake news and defining some network characteristics for each users' group. We utilized a set of fact-checking websites in the Arab world that report social media posts spreading fake news and the interactions with them. We defined three sets of users: 1) Spreaders, who spread fake news, 2) Checkers, who constantly share fact-checking threads, and 3) Refuters, who respond to fake-news posts declaring their inaccuracy. We build a classifier that uses users' network graph to predict their reactions with an accuracy exceeding 93%. We applied further analysis for the most significant features of each users group and noticed that spreaders interact with more accounts that use their mother tongue, a considerable number of famous state-sponsored accounts, and accounts that get suspended while checkers and refuters interact with more foreign accounts and news-reporting entities. Central nodes in the networks of spreaders were found to be linked with state-sponsored media, whereas central nodes in the networks of checkers included organizations with a cross-cultural nature.

Legal Framework for Socially Responsible Social Media Platforms in Pakistan

ABSTRACT This research is aimed to investigate wider phenomenon of possible need for legislation for regulation of social media in Pakistan. In-depth interview research method was applied under Qualitative study to investigate this phenomenon. Overall, 10 respondents from law and media departments from public as well as private sector universities of five main cities were chosen to collect their opinion with the help of 15 structured questionnaire with open ended approach. The study found out that there was no legislation existent for regulation of social media in Pakistan. The study revealed voices were raised from different corners of society including journalistic bodies labelling restriction and embargo on freedom of speech. The study concluded that the government should introduce such legislation after having detailed discussion with relevant stakeholders including public sector media organizations, information departments, law and media departments and other relevant stakeholders. The study concluded that socially responsible legislation was required for socially responsible social media in Pakistan. Purpose: The basic objective of this study was to unearth existing legal framework for regulation of social media in the country at par with the international best standards for regulation of social media. This study was tasked to ascertain the opinion of the relevant stakeholders of social media of public and private sector and recommend socially responsible social media in the country. However, the legislation should equally be acceptable for all the relevant stakeholders to make social media effective with its positive use in the long run. Design/Methodology/Approach: Qualitative study was employed along with in-depth interviews having 15 structured questions with open approach to collect data from 10 respondents from five media and law departments from public and private sector universities. Findings: The results showcased the findings that there was no existent legal framework for regulation of social media in hand. However, in recent past, the federal government has constituted a separate department called National Cyber Crime Investigation Agency (NCCIA) to regulate social media as well as investigate online crimes being committed on social media. However, the legislation was unavailable in this regard. The results revealed all the stakeholders can assemble at one point and draw an effective legislation in this regard to make social media socially reasonable. Implications/Originality/Value: This study seems valuable to the extent as it provides a ray of hope to the depressed consumers of social media especially the parents and teachers as the socially responsible legislation may turn social media as positive platforms. This study may also provide guidelines for the future researchers to investigate the phenome at provincial and district level in the country.

The Brussels Effect in Brazil: Analysing the impact of the EU digital services act on the discussion surrounding the fake news bill

The May 2023 version of Brazil's Fake News Bill (FNB), a proposed new statutory framework for social media regulation, heavily referenced the EU's Digital Services Act (DSA). The literature on regulatory convergence points to the Brussels Effect, praising the EU for wielding unilateral soft power in shaping global regulations. Therefore, based on interviews with Brazilian experts who played a significant role in the regulatory discussion, this study applies Thematic Analysis to assess the DSA's impact on the FNB draft. The article finds limited Brussels Effect due to criticism of its incapacity to address local platform liability concerns and the absence of economic and legal drivers for convergence with EU regulation. Despite this, the study highlights the DSA's positive influence on the local debate in promoting democratic and human rights principles, leveraging the European legislative process to enrich local discussions. Finally, local political factors contributed to a narrative that differed from the DSA, framing the FNB not only as a tool against disinformation, but also as a means to protect democracy. This paper offers an unprecedented case study of the Brussels Effect reach on the global-south, presenting limitations of the EU benchmark when transposed to other regulatory and political contexts.

Conspiracy beliefs and social media: Addressing a systemic risk

Conspiracy beliefs are an important lever for hybrid threat activity. It presents a risk for liberal democratic governance at multiple levels. The widespread circulation of conspiracy beliefs on social media contributes to discrediting sources of authority, science, and expertise. This article addresses the circulation of conspiracy beliefs on social media as a systemic risk. Because social media companies operate within a legal loophole of facilitating illegal and harmful content, they have become the primary medium for the spreading of conspiracy beliefs. This article suggests closing the legal loophole since it provides a space for potential hybrid threat activity. Social media companies should be made responsible for content published through their services in a similar fashion to that of regular news media. It explores the extent to which regulation of social media could be a systemic response to the challenge of conspiratorialism as a space for hybrid threat activity directed at our democratic societies.

Tale of an ill-fated scapegoat: National security and the struggle for state regulation of social media in Nigeria

The struggle for state regulation of the social media in Nigeria today finds expression in the desperate efforts by state actors to foster a negative relationship between the platforms and national security. The ban on Twitter in the country recently is a manifestation of the grand plan to regulate social media operation, which has been on-going since the inception of the current administration in 2015, with the narrative of national security prominently featured as a key justification. Using data derived from secondary sources, this study underscores the struggle for state regulation of the social media in Nigeria and the accompanying implications. Drawing insights from two recent case studies in the country – the 2020 #EndSARS protest and 2021 Twitter ban, the study argues that attempts at social media regulation hinged on national security are counterproductive and, if actualized, will close up available spaces that citizens have at their disposal to engage in critical discourse on pressing national security issues. The study contends that social media are key tools for robust discourse towards facilitating responsive governance in the twenty-first century as experience in Nigeria recently has shown. Against this backdrop, it argues that although Nigeria is confronted with a multiplicity of security challenges at the moment, attempts at hinging this rising tide of insecurity on the social media with the aim of regulating them amount to a misplaced priority and present the platforms as ill-fated scapegoats. Arguments in the study suggest that the basic motivations for social media regulation in Nigeria are repressive in nature and portend damaging implications to the process of good governance and democratic consolidation.

SOCIAL MEDIA ABUSE AND ITS IMPLICATIONS FOR DEMOCRACY IN NIGERIA

Nigeria’s democracy has been under the siege of incessant crises and these crises are a culmination of the country’s successive years of corruption, human rights violation and in recent times the misuse of social media (through the use of propaganda, cyber bullying and cyber harassment) that heats up the polity and generates bitter politics, hate and bigotry. The implication of this is that it creates a rife environment for continuous electoral violence and ethnic strife that consequently undermines democracy. In the light of this, the objective of this paper seeks to identify how the wrong use of social media can be a threat to the consolidation of democracy in Nigeria. Qualitative method based on document investigation was adopted and the findings from this paper revealed that some of the causes of social media abuse is the culture of gross impunity of the Nigerian society and the lack of effective regulation of social media by governmental institutions. It therefore concludes and recommends that effective policies must be enforced to end the culture of impunity and abuse of social media in order to put an end to ethnic cynicism, ethnic conflicts and hateful politics that breeds sycophants, political violence and the consequent destruction of public administration in Nigeria.

Freedom of Expression and Information Amidst Strict Social Media Regulation in Nigeria: An Appraisal of the Twitter Ban

Freedom of Expression and Information Amidst Strict Social Media Regulation in Nigeria: An Appraisal of the Twitter Ban

Exposure to digital vape marketing among young people in Aotearoa New Zealand.

Little is known about the exposure of young people in Aotearoa New Zealand to marketing of vape products on social media. This study investigated vaping behaviour and the extent of vape marketing exposure and engagement that young people (14-20 years) report on social media and examined differences across socio-demographic groups. An online survey was conducted with 3,698 participants aged between 14-20 years (M=17.1; SD=1.8). A range of genders (55.7% females, 38.3% males and 6% another gender), ethnicities (25.6% Māori, 46.7% Pākehā or NZ European, 6.5% Pasifika and 21.2% another ethnicity) and social classes took part. Half (50.8%; n=1,110) of the respondents (N=2,185) reported that they had vaped at least once; vaping history was positively related to exposure to and engagement with digital vape marketing. Half (50.3%; n=1,119) of the respondents (N=2,224) reported seeing vape marketing on at least one social media platform. Binary logistic regressions showed that younger respondents were more likely to report seeing vape marketing than older respondents, and Māori and Pasifika more likely than other ethnicities. Over a quarter (26%; n=563) of respondents (N=2,148) reported engaging with vape marketing online, with Māori and Pasifika respondents more likely to engage than other ethnicity groups, and similarly for respondents of lower compared to higher socio-economic status. No interaction effects were found. Many young people, including a subset under the legal age for purchase, reported seeing vape product marketing on social media platforms. Patterns of exposure to vape product marketing on social media mirror the inequitable marketing exposure of harmful commodities in physical environments. Improved transparency and regulation of social media marketing is required.

AdversaFlow: Visual Red Teaming for Large Language Models with Multi-Level Adversarial Flow.

Large Language Models (LLMs) are powerful but also raise significant security concerns, particularly regarding the harm they can cause, such as generating fake news that manipulates public opinion on social media and providing responses to unethical activities. Traditional red teaming approaches for identifying AI vulnerabilities rely on manual prompt construction and expertise. This paper introduces AdversaFlow, a novel visual analytics system designed to enhance LLM security against adversarial attacks through human-AI collaboration. AdversaFlow involves adversarial training between a target model and a red model, featuring unique multi-level adversarial flow and fluctuation path visualizations. These features provide insights into adversarial dynamics and LLM robustness, enabling experts to identify and mitigate vulnerabilities effectively. We present quantitative evaluations and case studies validating our system's utility and offering insights for future AI security solutions. Our method can enhance LLM security, supporting downstream scenarios like social media regulation by enabling more effective detection, monitoring, and mitigation of harmful content and behaviors.

Social Media Regulation in the Wake of 303 Creative v. Elenis

Social Media Regulation in the Wake of 303 Creative v. Elenis

Abuse of Women and Children in Armed Conflict and Domestically: More Effective Safeguarding Systems Urgently Needed to Prevent these Crimes and Ensure Protection

Emergency medicine health workers have major roles in managing the clinical effects of armed conflict and domestic abuse on women and children. To safeguard vulnerable people from such criminal abuse, there is an urgent need for international and domestic action. International and national legal systems need to work more rapidly and efficiently with immediate power to protect against, and prevent, such abuse. Internationally, the current weakness of the United Nations Security Council to provide civilian protection, such as through UN troops on the ground and no-fly zones over conflict areas, and thereby minimise the effects of armed conflict on civilians, can, and has, largely resulted from self-serving, dangerous vetoes of the 5 permanent members with major conflicts of interest, in part related to their role in the manufacturing and global distribution of weapons. The International Court of Justice and the International Criminal Court have little immediate power to protect civilians affected by war crimes, including abuse, which breach the Geneva and other International Conventions. To date, the number of war criminals convicted by the International Criminal Court is incredibly small, and the long delay in the Courts’ decisions mean that the consequences of the war crimes sometimes continue for years. We describe new systems to better protect women and children from abuse in the home. We propose a new definition that separates ill treatment from criminal abuse that is undertaken for gain by perpetrators (who are often carers or intimate partners with antisocial personality disorders). Ill treatment undertaken within families experiencing adversity such as homelessness, poverty, displacement, and addiction requires compassion and socio-economic support. In contrast the crimes of abuse committed for gain require stronger forensic approaches investigated and addressed by special, inter-agency, forensic taskforce units led by senior experienced detectives in partnership with social, healthcare, and legal professionals. We also discuss additional issues linked to abuse, such as the links between animal/pet abuse and human abuse, the need for better systems to prevent and protect children living in institutions, better regulation of social media to protect children from scenes of violence and sexual abuse, and gun control needed to protect children, especially in the USA.

SOSYAL MEDYADA SİYASİ MANİPÜLASYON: POLİTİKA ÖNERİLERİ VE POTANSİYEL TEPKİLER

This research examines the prevalent problem of political influence on social media platforms, its ramifications, and prospective reactions from Generation Z. Through an analysis of manipulation theories in the context of the digital era, including cognitive, emotional, and behavioral strategies, this study provides insights into the swift propagation of misinformation and the influence of algorithmic personalisation. This study conducts a comprehensive examination of relevant scholarly literature, with a particular focus on the impact of political misinformation on democratic processes. The subsequent analysis delves into the likely responses of Generation Z towards social media regulation, taking into account their inclination towards endorsing measures aimed at countering manipulation, while also expressing apprehensions over privacy and freedom of expression. This study highlights the significance of well-informed policy formulation in order to effectively tackle manipulation, while also taking into account the viewpoints of the younger demographic.

The Impact of Social Media Crisis on Business: BMW Ice Cream Incident as an Example

On 20 April 2023, BMW was accused of suspected anti-Chinese discrimination at Shanghai international Automobile Industry Exhibition show, mainly because the staff at BMW booth appeared to have deliberately ignored requests from Chinese people to receive free ice-cream. The aim of this paper is to investigate the effect of social media crisis on the business, by taking this BMW ice cream incident as an example. The main research methodology in this article is to use ARIMA model to predict the trend of the BMW share price excluding the effect of this incident based on stock return analysis and then compare it to the real data. The findings from this research provide evidence that predicted stock price are close to the real one, which shows that the possible short-term negative impact of BMWs reputation may appear as a result of this incident, but due to BMWs quality and product status, the negative performance will still not exist for a long-term. The main conclusion drawn from this study is social media scandal may not have lasting impact on business. Different from previous literature, this study contributes on the ARIMA analysis on the certain companys data to derive the relationship between the stock price and the social media crisis. Recommendations include: Improving social media regulation for policy makers; Establishing dedicated teams for dealing with social media information; Changing investment strategy cautiously based on social media messages.

Research on Ways to Ameliorate the Degree of Peoples Euroscepticism after the Brexit Referendum

After the Brexit referendum, some scholars predicted it could have a demonstration effect, leading to increased public skepticism towards the European Union (EU). In response to this challenge, EU countries have implemented a series of reform measures, which have proven to be effective, but with varying degrees of success. Previous research mainly focused on the impact of Brexit on the EU and the countermeasures taken by the EU, without a deeper study of which combination of reform measures is more effective. This paper conducts a qualitative comparative analysis of the various reforms implemented by EU member states. The results show that the most effective combination of measures consists of three parallel causal paths: effective promotion of EU citizenship, effective economic policy reform, and reduction of social welfare; effective promotion of EU citizenship, increased awareness of hate speech and other extremist discourse through education, increased support for refugees and ethnic minorities, and strengthened social media regulation; effective promotion of EU citizenship, promotion of cultural understanding through education, increased support for civil society organizations against extremism, and effective economic policy reform. Effective citizenship reform presents to be a necessary condition. The paths to reducing public skepticism towards the EU are diverse, and effective economic policy reform, strengthened social media regulation, and promotion of cultural understanding through education are all more effective in increasing public trust in the EU.

Fighting the infodemic: the 4 i Framework for Advancing Communication and Trust

BackgroundThe proliferation of false and misleading health claims poses a major threat to public health. This ongoing “infodemic” has prompted numerous organizations to develop tools and approaches to manage the spread of falsehoods and communicate more effectively in an environment of mistrust and misleading information. However, these tools and approaches have not been systematically characterized, limiting their utility. This analysis provides a characterization of the current ecosystem of infodemic management strategies, allowing public health practitioners, communicators, researchers, and policy makers to gain an understanding of the tools at their disposal.MethodsA multi-pronged search strategy was used to identify tools and approaches for combatting health-related misinformation and disinformation. The search strategy included a scoping review of academic literature; a review of gray literature from organizations involved in public health communications and misinformation/disinformation management; and a review of policies and infodemic management approaches from all U.S. state health departments and select local health departments. A team of annotators labelled the main feature(s) of each tool or approach using an iteratively developed list of tags.ResultsWe identified over 350 infodemic management tools and approaches. We introduce the 4 i Framework for Advancing Communication and Trust (4 i FACT), a modified social-ecological model, to characterize different levels of infodemic intervention: informational, individual, interpersonal, and institutional. Information-level strategies included those designed to amplify factual information, fill information voids, debunk false information, track circulating information, and verify, detect, or rate the credibility of information. Individual-level strategies included those designed to enhance information literacy and prebunking/inoculation tools. Strategies at the interpersonal/community level included resources for public health communicators and community engagement approaches. Institutional and structural approaches included resources for journalists and fact checkers, tools for managing academic/scientific literature, resources for infodemic researchers/research, resources for infodemic managers, social media regulation, and policy/legislation.ConclusionsThe 4 i FACT provides a useful way to characterize the current ecosystem of infodemic management strategies. Recognizing the complex and multifaceted nature of the ongoing infodemic, efforts should be taken to utilize and integrate strategies across all four levels of the modified social-ecological model.