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Author
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Christian Reuter, Amanda Lee Hughes, Cody Buntain
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Year
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2024
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Publisher
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Taylor and Francis Group
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Abstract
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The rise of fake news and misinformation in the digital age poses serious risks for individuals andsociety, particularly during crises like the Israel-Hamas war, the Russian-Ukraine war, or the COVID-19 pandemic. Misinformation serves as a tool to manipulate public opinion and create discord.Vulnerability to manipulation increases in online spaces during crises, where authoritativeinformation is scarce. Emergency management, public health, political and publicadministration, as well as media professionals and citizens express concern and seek solutionsto enhance information quality during such critical times. This article highlights user-centredapproaches to countering fake news and misinformation, tracing their historical evolution fromancient Greece to the present, focussing on their relevance during the COVID-19 crisis and incontemporary information warfare. It describes the vulnerability of audiences to misinformationand outlines prevailing trends in user-centred countermeasures. This article also introducesrecent research on the effectiveness of media literacy interventions on truth discernment, across-cultural comparison of the perception of negative consequences and the injunctive norm,a comparison of video and text to promote lateral reading in adolescents, content-specificindicators on Twitter from a user perspective, a learning system for detecting misinformation aswell as ethical and security considerations in automated detection.