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What does deregulation have to do with climate change deniers? The answer lies in the book Merchants of Doubt.After writing Merchants of Doubt in 2010, Naomi Oreskes reasoned that climate change deniers were not motivated by questions about science. Instead, their denial stemmed from political concerns—questions about the appropriate role of government.

Have you ever been influenced by someone online? Followed someone's life through a screen, building a parasocial bond? Using this personal connection to their advantage, online personalities – influencers – hold power. They can shape their followers' behavior, ethics, and even political beliefs. But what happens when influencers promote ideas that favor a private company? Questions arise about how corporate influence is flooding our digital spaces.

Has a company become more sustainable, does it recycle materials, and reduce carbon emissions – or have you fallen for Greenwashing? The term Greenwashing describes false, deceiving or misleading claims about environmental action, sustainability and recycling. Private sector organizations like companies and brands make these claims in order to market a product, a service and to promote a greener image.

Generative AI tools, bots, trolls, and citizens who fall prey to disinformation efforts all flood our digital spaces with disinformation, conspiracy theories, and narratives that aim to influence you and your decision-making process, confuse you, sow doubt in you, and cloud your thinking. These dynamics enable politicians and others to claim misinformation as a means to evade accountability, framing authentic content as false.

Generative AI. Fake media outlets. Bots. These factors have changed the media landscape drastically, affecting the legitimacy of information we see online and spreading more polarizing political narratives all while making it harder to distinguish between what is real and what is fabricated information. Fake media outlets that pose as real news sources are often created for financial or ideological motives. What can be done to navigate through this sea of disinformation?

When a story, meme, image, hashtag, or video suddenly trends on social media without any credible media outlets reporting on it, it's highly likely that this content was artificially boosted. This process often involves deployment of automated bots to share, comment on, and amplify the content, creating the illusion of widespread engagement with specific narratives and information. The strategic use of bots to spread and amplify certain content and narratives can have signifi

We like to think our opinions are our own - based on facts, experience, and good judgment. But in reality, we’re more influenced by the crowd than we’d like to admit. That’s the Bandwagon Effect in action: when we see others supporting an idea, we’re more likely to adopt it ourselves. It’s human nature. The problem is, online, what looks like a crowd isn’t always real.

After the Cambridge Analytica scandal, disinformation-for-hire firms gained traction by offering microtargeted ad services and influence campaigns that seemed both profitable and legally permissible, drawing interest from private companies. Their transnational reach and promise of deniability make it challenging to trace funding and hold those responsible to account, weakening democratic transparency.

Internet memes may seem like a playful, innocent media format, often associated with younger generations producing these media formats for purely entertainment purposes. And while they often are, this is not always the case, as their role can extend far beyond entertainment. Over the last two decades, memes have emerged as powerful tools. From raising awareness of climate science to obstructing energy policy debates and promoting climate change denial, the possibilities are v

Ecofascism emerged during the COVID-19 pandemic, combining environmental concerns with fascist ideologies, exploiting public anxieties about climate change to promote and impose their own agendas.

The Spiral of Silence theory explains how people tend to avoid expressing opinions that contradict a dominant public viewpoint due to fear of rejection and isolation, as seen in the marginalized voices of Jews during the World War II. In the digital world, the use of bots, AI-generated content, and other tools can artificially shape discussions, contributing to the Spiral of Silence effect, where real users of digital platforms may be inclined to self-censor their seemingly m

When accepting cookies on a website, you may not think about what you are agreeing to. However, the clicks you make and the things you pause to look at are valuable information to certain actors. These choices, along with other personal data, help create a profile of you. And who benefits from this data? Advertisers aiming to tailor the right ad to you, yes – but also political actors and other private interests. How can we find consensus on climate issues in such a fragmente

Senate hearing reports reveal that major oil companies spent decades deliberately sowing doubt and confusion regarding the dangers of fossil fuels, despite possessing clear knowledge of their harmful impacts on the planet.

Climate activists have been a target of media and political scrutiny, framed as if they are part of a ‘doomsday cult’.