50 percent of information on the internet is not true or verified: DNPA’s Tanmay Maheshwari
In Q3 of 2020, there were 1.8 million fake news engagements on Facebook. And there were 18 million pieces of Covid-19 misinformation on the internet, says Tanmay Maheshwari, chairman, Digital News Publishers Association, and managing director, Amar Ujala.
The DNPA Conclave & Awards were presented today (February 6) in New Delhi, and featured a keynote address by union ministers Anurag Thakur and Rajeev Chandrasekhar.
This edition of the conclave was organised by the Digital News Publishers Association (DNPA) in association with Storyboard18. It began with a welcome address by Tanmay Maheshwari, chairman, Digital News Publishers Association (DNPA) and managing director, Amar Ujala.
Speaking about DNPA, Maheshwari noted that it was an association of the digital arms of legacy news media companies. “We represent more than 80 percent of digital news traffic in the country,” he explained, emphasising that DNPA members provide free flowing, verified information in the digital ecosystem.
In the age of the internet, which abounds with multiple sources of information, Maheshwari asserted that genuine sources of information are drying up. He cited the example of young children turning to the internet to search for information. But, what they find is “vultures of misinformation”, who trap them in an “endless loop of information bias”, the DNPA chief noted.
“Actually, half of the internet’s information is not true or verified,” said Maheshwari. He noted that in Q3 of 2020, there were 1.8 million fake news engagements on Facebook and 18 million pieces of Covid-19 misinformation on the internet. Making matters worse, publishers of misinformation get six times more engagement than the actual news, lamented Maheshwari.
India is on the cusp of rolling out a forward looking regulatory mechanism in the Digital India Act, which should help create a more level playing field in the digital ecosystem, Maheshwari concluded.
