COVID Conspiracies

From the Document: "Multiple states across the US are launching or scaling up mass contact tracing campaigns as part of their preparations to reopen society. On 1 May, the H.R.6666 - Covid-19 [coronavirus disease 2019] Testing, Reaching, And Contacting Everyone (TRACE) bill was introduced to Congress by Representative Bobby Rush. This bill would allow the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to award $100 billion in grants for testing, contact tracing, monitoring, and other activities to address COVID-19. Both the H.R 6666 legislation and state-based contact-tracing efforts more broadly have become the focus of significant suspicion, hostility and opposition within some social media communities, particularly among pro-gun and conspiracy-theory groups. This dynamic is being generated both by individual social media users and by key influencers in conspiratorial communities."

From the Introduction: "The report finds that: [1] People who believe conspiracy theories about Covid-19 [coronavirus disease 2019] are more likely to have broken key lockdown rules: for example, 38% of those who think there is no hard evidence that Covid-19 really exists have had family/friends visit them at home, compared with 12% of those who think that's false. [2] People who believe in conspiracy theories are more likely to be getting their information about Covid-19 from social media: for example, 60% of those who believe the symptoms are linked to 5G [5th generation] radiation say that much of their information on Covid-19 comes from YouTube, compared with 14% of those who think that's false. [3] People who have broken key lockdown rules are more likely to be getting their information about Covid-19 from social media: for example, 58% of those who have gone outside when they had symptoms that could be Covid-19 say that much of their information on Covid-19 comes from YouTube, compared with 16% of those who haven't."

From the Document: "For a few weeks now, conspiracy theories around 5G and Coronavirus have been flooding the web, leading to real-life incidents with acts of vandalism on cell towers in the UK. Despite being strongly refuted by scientists, these theories range from the claim that 5G alters people's immune system to the idea that 5G changes people's DNA, thus making people more susceptible to contracting COVID-19 [coronavirus disease 2019]. We traced back the diffusion and content moderation timeline of a conspiracy video across several social media platforms. The velocity of such content is alarming. Before its removal, the content had been viewed over a million times and shared hundreds of thousands of times."

From the Foreword: "Following on the heels of a state-by-state lockdown of social and economic activity put in place to attempt to contain the spread of the novel coronavirus pandemic, we stand in the midst of historical nationwide violence and riots over the George Floyd incident. Together, these events cause social dislocation on a scale not seen since the Great Depression. Not surprisingly in such an environment, fear of disease, fear of law enforcement, and fear of violence are compounded by social isolation and widespread unemployment. It is not surprising, in this season of discontent, that many Americans have grown frustrated with the restrictions on their freedoms, and angry at the repeated confrontations involving law enforcement. Many have exercised their constitutional rights to freedom of speech and assembly to express their anger in a peaceful manner."

From the Document: "This paper examines various framing processes have been developed by Far Right groups specifically in response to the global health crisis brought about by the spread of COVID-19 [coronavirus disease 2019]. Through an examination of statements by six Identitarian and National Socialist movement organisations issued over a two month period from late February to late April 2020 on the open source platform Telegram, six 'crisis frames' were identified which extended central Far Right ideological ideas and cast COVID-19 as directly linked to concepts of migration, globalisation, governance, liberty, resilience and conspiracy. As well as identifying the crisis frames used by Far Right, this paper found that these Far Right groups emphasised engagement in activity designed to develop community resilience and - in contrast to initial commentary by analysts - conspiracy theories and practices of misinformation were largely not used. These findings suggest that the early stages of the COVID crisis has seen a shift by certain Far Right groups not towards practices of encouraging violent contention but rather using propaganda to emphasise their contribution in supporting the family unit, communities and the nation, against the failures of authorities in dealing with the virus. This paper represents an early foray into understanding the development of contemporary 'crisis frames' within the Far Right, highlighting the interactive processes that take place between Far Right groups, global events and authorities."

From the Abstract: "Social media platforms have long been recognised as major disseminators of health misinformation. Many previous studies have found a negative association between health-protective behaviours and belief in the specific form of misinformation popularly known as 'conspiracy theory'. Concerns have arisen regarding the spread of COVID-19 [coronavirus disease 2019] conspiracy theories on social media. [...] Three questionnaire surveys of social media use, conspiracy beliefs and health-protective behaviours with regard to COVID-19 among UK residents were carried out online, one using a self-selecting sample (N = 949) and two using stratified random samples from a recruited panel (N = 2250, N = 2254). [...] All three studies found a negative relationship between COVID-19 conspiracy beliefs and COVID-19 health-protective behaviours, and a positive relationship between COVID-19 conspiracy beliefs and use of social media as a source of information about COVID-19. Studies 2 and 3 also found a negative relationship between COVID-19 health-protective behaviours and use of social media as a source of information, and Study 3 found a positive relationship between health-protective behaviours and use of broadcast media as a source of information."

From the Document: "The COVID-19 [coronavirus disease 2019] pandemic is a fertile breeding ground for conspiracy theories. When people suffer a loss of control or feel threatened, they become more vulnerable to believing conspiracies. For example, the Black Death in the 14th century inspired anti-Semitic hysteria and when cholera broke out in Russia in 1892, blame fell on doctors and crowds hunted down anybody in a white coat. How do we avoid being misled by baseless conspiracy theories? Conspiracy theories are identified by telltale thought patterns. Learning these patterns is key to inoculating ourselves and society against the corrosive influence of conspiracy theories."

From the Document: "Against the backdrop of the global Covid-19 [coronavirus disease 2019] pandemic, billionaire philanthropist Bill Gates has become the subject of a diverse and rapidly expanding universe of conspiracy theories. As an example, a recent poll found that 44% of Republicans and 19% of Democrats in the US now believe that Gates is linked to a plot to use vaccinations as a pretext to implant microchips into people. And it's not just America: 13% of Australians believe that Bill Gates played a role in the creation and spread of the coronavirus, and among young Australians it's 20%. Protests around the world, from Germany to Melbourne, have included anti-Gates chants and slogans."

From the Introduction: "A common refrain among those worried about influence operations is that the amplification of truth will triumph over disinformation. Influence operations are organized activities used to affect an audience or outcome. And disinformation, or the intentional spreading of misleading or untrue information, is a common tactic in such operations. On the surface, this truth-focused approach seems simple. If truth is preferable to lies, then educating people to easily identify the difference between accurate information and disinformation would lead them to shun untruthful alternatives. The coronavirus pandemic offers a unique opportunity to analyze this approach. Today's digitally connected information space is an extremely challenging operating environment. Communicating the truth nowadays is a lot like hollering into a sprawling, open bazaar where some people might be straining to hear, but the vast majority are making noise and going about their own business. In this market, attention rather than valid information is the most valuable commodity. Many actors attempt to be heard in a crisis. This includes actors with both good and bad intentions, and myriad bystanders who take up and spread content not so much with a motive in mind, but as a quick response to the information they consume."

From the Document: "As conspiracy theories about COVID-19 [coronavirus disease 2019] take root in the United States, understanding the psychological foundations of conspiracy beliefs is increasingly critical. Our research shows that beliefs in two popular variants of COVID-19 conspiracy theory are the joint product of the psychological predispositions 1) to reject information coming from experts and other authority figures and 2) to view major events as the product of conspiracies, as well as partisan and ideological motivations. The psychological foundations of conspiracy beliefs have implications for the development of strategies designed to curtail their negative consequences."