Researcher says global events can bring on floods of misinformation [Video]

Misinformation expert Tim Caulfield joins Alberta Primetime host Michael Higgins to discuss the social media response following the recent shooting at a rally for former President Donald Trump.

Michael Higgins: US President Joe Biden in a national address calling for calm and civility in the wake of the weekend assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump, an attack that left a bystander dead and two others critically injured. It also spawned a flood of conjecture and conspiracy theories.

Social media was awash with speculation and outrageous claims within minutes of the attack. What does the immediacy of that response speak to?

Tim Caulfield: It’s incredible. It really was absolutely immediate and it was instantaneously polarized. So first of all, of course social media is playing a huge role here.

There’s been some analysis that suggests as much as 45 per cent of the content was created by bots, which really gives you a sense …