Circulation of Fake News: Threat Analysis Model to Assess the Impact on Society and Public Safety

Fake news is becoming a major concern for researchers and policy makers due to its substantial effects on our societies and public safety. Today with the exponential growth in the use of social media, it is becoming very difficult for citizens and concerned stakeholders to distinguish fake news from real news. WhatsApp, as a popular social media application, has risen in a relatively short period of time to become the de facto communication medium in a large number of countries throughout the world. However, the impact of fake news spread via WhatsApp on public safety is still vague and while most countries have been so far spared from major incidents affecting a significant part of the population explicitly due to the circulation of fake news on WhatsApp, other countries have unfortunately been impacted which led to chaos and crimes there. This research analyzes the threats to public safety emanating from the circulation of fake news on the WhatsApp messaging application. Moreover, it classifies these threats according to severity and urgency in order to propose a threat analysis model that allows to properly address and formulate adapted solutions. Finally, this study yields valuable practical implications to policy makers and security authorities by listing some methods and strategies to counter these threats, ranging from public awareness and adapted mass media communication to technical methods using Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence.