Google is using ‘prebunking’ to fight misinformation. But one of the term’s creators says it’s no panacea

Prebunking is a concept that’s several years old, and it’s based on inoculation theory. Instead of merely trying to debunk misinformation that’s already gone viral, the idea is to give people tips on how to spot the sorts of misinformation that they are likely to encounter, so they’re primed to be less susceptible to it. Think of it as a psychological vaccine, in this case, administered via ads on platforms including Google’s own YouTube, as well as Facebook and TikTok—here’s an example from Poland, attempting to steer people away from the false but fast-moving narrative that Ukrainian refugees are being treated better than Polish citizens.

But wait, isn’t that just media literacy—teaching people how to be more critical consumers of information? Not quite, according to Jon Roozenbeek of the University of Cambridge, who was one of the academics who came up with the prebunking concept and who has subsequently worked with Google’s Jigsaw division on developing tools to implement it.

For one thing, he told me in a conversation today, prebunking is more likely to reach people who are outside the educational system. It’s also designed to be more lighthearted. “The challenge is, how do you get people interested in how to identify harmful or misinforming content without feeling patronized or talked down to?” Roozenbeek told me. “Leveraging humor is a good way to do it.”

The approach is promising, Roozenbeek said—but he also warned that “we shouldn’t see this as a panacea.” 

“Individual-level interventions” like prebunking and media literacy programs need to be frequently repeated, otherwise people forget what to look for, whereas “system-level interventions”—like the EU’s incoming Digital Services Act, which will force Big Tech to tackle disinformation—have a much greater effect, he said. 

However, there’s a tradeoff, as those system-level interventions are also the ones that carry greater risk. Facebook could scrub its platform of all misinformation if it wanted to, Roozenbeek said, but in doing so it would also remove a lot of content that isn’t misinformation, raising big free-speech problems. “If you debunk someone, none of their rights are violated. If I show someone a YouTube ad that explains to them how a false dichotomy works, again, no harm done,” he noted.

All this is cutting-edge stuff, concocted to confront an urgent, visible problem. But what happens when automatically generated misinformation becomes more prevalent? Roozenbeek believes there is potential for bots to become less easily identifiable as such, as they become integrated with generative A.I. systems like OpenAI’s ChatGPT—and if and when that happens, it will again require new solutions.

“I don’t think prebunking or media literacy help all that much [in such a scenario], because there has to be a particular skill you want people to pick up on, in order for that to be effective,” Roozenbeek said. “You can’t do that for content that has no markers you can pick up on.”

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David Meyer

Data Sheet’s daily news section was written and curated by Andrea Guzman. 

NEWSWORTHY

More tech layoffs could be on the horizon. For multiple teams at Meta, budgets have yet to be finalized leaving some employees to speculate that they could be laid off soon. Staffers told the Financial Times that little work is getting completed amid the uncertainty. “The year of efficiency is kicking off with a bunch of people getting paid to do nothing,” one worker told the FT. Meanwhile, Twilio executives held a meeting right before the Super Bowl, Insider reports. It’s an unusual move that’s causing some employees to worry about possible layoffs. 

Meet Poe. Social Q&A platform Quora has produced a chatbot known as Poe. The tool is not named after the poet or Teletubby but stands for “platform for open exploration.” It can use ChatGPT and Anthropic’s Claude to deliver answers instantly, and Wired talked to Quora cofounder and CEO Adam D’Angelo, who also sits on the board of ChatGPT maker OpenAI’s nonprofit arm. While Poe’s responses might not be perfect, D’Angelo is optimistic that A.I. will continue to improve.

Uber is driven to the cloud. The ride-hailing company has signed deals with Google Cloud and Oracle that will allow it to ditch its data centers and move to the cloud, according to the Wall Street Journal. Uber currently runs 95% of its IT infrastructure inside its own data centers, an approach that left the company vulnerable to delays obtaining new equipment during the pandemic’s supply-chain crunch. The financial terms of the seven-year cloud deals are not being disclosed. 

FOOD FOR THOUGHT

Not-so-early risers. While TikTokers and books like The 5AM Club proclaim that there are benefits to waking up early such as exercising and catching up on emails before work, others aren’t having it. Fortune talked to more than a dozen CEOs who have pushed back against the narrative that rising early pushes you to be more productive. 

From the article: 

Jessica Alderson, CEO of dating app So Syncd, typically goes to bed between 2 a.m. and 3 a.m., and is awake by around 9 a.m.

“Despite the business world idolizing early risers, some CEOs are more productive as night owls, and I include myself in that category,” she said.

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT

Kevin O’Leary says he’ll likely invest in ChatGPT maker OpenAI—and likens its disruptive power to Amazon’s, by Steve Mollman

This CEO says an inexpensive meditation app is the key to her staying calm and feeling rested in stressful times, by Fortune Editors

Twitter’s culture shift post–Elon Musk takeover is drastic: A ‘ghost town’ Slack, terrible coffee, and the work beds are fully booked on weeknights, by Prarthana Prakash

How much would America’s richest people pay under Biden’s billionaire tax? It’s complicated, by Alicia Adamczyk

Hybrid work makes people better at their jobs, from commuting to ‘deep work.’ But companies aren’t doing it right, by Trey Williams

Elon Musk warns once again that Twitter will remove ‘corrupt’ legacy blue checks despite his disastrous paid verification rollout, by Azure Gilman

PayPal just paused its plan to release a stablecoin after reports its partner is under investigation amid a larger crypto crackdown, by Ben Weiss

BEFORE YOU GO

Tesla’s strange Super Bowl moment. Tesla didn’t run an ad during the Super Bowl on Sunday, but the electric-car maker was featured in one of the premium-priced commercials. A Super Bowl ad from the Dawn Project called for a ban on Tesla’s Full Self-Driving (FSD) feature. Green Hills Software CEO Dan O’Dowd spent $600,000 on the ad showing a Tesla hitting a mannequin and a stroller and driving past Do Not Enter signs. While Tesla has threatened the Dawn Project with legal action in the past, Elon Musk—who was at the game—acted unbothered, tweeting that the ad will “greatly increase public awareness that a Tesla can drive itself (supervised for now).”