Bots were the primary driver behind the spread of COVID-19 misinformation online, a new study suggests. Researchers looked at the sharing of different links related to the pandemic in more than 300,000 posts made to Facebook groups. Researchers found that a large portion of misinformation about Covid-19, masks and the vaccines were spread by bot accounts on social media. Posts of the study is Facebook groups with detected bot activity were 2.3 times more likely to share the false claim that masks hurt their wearer. 'In our case study, bots mischaracterized a prominent publication from a prestigious medical journal to spread misinformation.'

Source: The Nation June 07, 2021 15:00 UTC