As Facebook executives appeared last Thursday before a Senate hearing in the United States to defend the world's most-accessed and frequented communication platform against accusations of promoting disinformation, a rigorous debate about fake news was taking centre stage at the Communication Policy Research South conference in Maputo, Mozambique, funded by the Canada-based International Development Research Centre (IDRC).
Less than two weeks earlier, another symposium on disinformation was organised in Jakarta by Digital Asia Hub, a Hong Kong-based think tank founded by the Berkman Klein Centre for Internet and Society at Harvard University. At the end of this month, another seminar will be held in Bangkok on the same theme by the Southeast Asian Press Alliance (Seapa), a regional NGO that promotes press freedom.
At least over the last year or so, no topic has been more hotly pursued in information-related academic and professional seminars than the likes of fake news, hoaxes, misinformation and disinformation.
