News
New Publication at CACM
6 Mar 2023
New paper on "New threats to society from free-speech social media platforms" accepted by Communications of the ACM (CACM).
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The new paper by Dominik Bär - PhD candidate and research assistant in our team - and other authors, on the topic of New threats to society from free-speech social media platforms has been accepted by Communications of the ACM (CACM).
Abstract
In recent years, several free-speech social media platforms (so-called "alt-techs") have emerged, such as Parler, Gab, and Telegram. These platforms market themselves as alternatives to mainstream social media and proclaim "free-speech" due to the absence of content moderation, which has been attracting a large base of partisan users, extremists, and supporters of conspiracy theories. In this comment, we discuss some of the threats that emerge from such social media platforms and call for more policy efforts directed at understanding and countering the risks for society.