In March, Clickbait and Disinformation dominated social topics - Kosovo Police the institution, Albin Kurti the most talked about figure
During March 2023, the topics on which misinformation content was created and distributed were about giving away wealth, the "Big Brother Vip Albania" program, employment in Germany, Prime Minister Kurti, murders, unfounded claims that Serbs are under pressure from Kosovo institutions, and other topics.
The topics on which the most misinformation publications have been created and distributed by various media outlets are those on social issues. The main topic in the social field is several articles reported as hoaxes, where through fake photos, fabricated stories are created that various people are donating wealth.
Political topics, again this month, are in second place in the context of political and security developments between Kosovo and Serbia, with particular emphasis on some unfounded claims by Serbian-language media about pressure and attacks organized by Kosovo against the Serbian community, misinformation about Prime Minister Kurti, etc.
The largest number of misinformation publications received "Clickbait" ratings at 27%, followed by the "Disinformation" category at 26%.
As a result of monitoring the types of misinformation publishers, this month is characterized by the fact that real media and various pages/groups/profiles on social media have published the most misinformation content and in the same percentage (45% each of these two types of media) during the month of March 2023.
In the month of March, the most talked about institution was the Kosovo Police by the media in the Serbian language related to the developments in the north, while the most talked about figure remains for this month the Prime Minister of Kosovo, Albin Kurti.
These data came from monitoring report which presents the state of misinformation for the month of March 2023 in content related to Kosovo, based on data provided by the fact-checking platform – hibrid.info. The report is designed by the fact-checking platform hibrid.info, part of the Kosovar NGO “Action for Democratic Society” (ADS) and supported by the American foundation “National Endowment for Democracy” (NED) within the framework of the project “Promoting Objective Journalism and Combating Disinformation”.
Monitoring data for this one-month period shows that real media, social media and dubious portals have distributed the most misinformation about and about Kosovo in the clickbait category with 27%, disinformation with 26% and fraud 14%. “Clickbait” ratings have mainly received misinformation about the dark chronicle and social issues, such as murders, disappearances, protests, children's health, employment in Germany, workers, etc. The misinformation articles categorized as “Disinformation” belong to the social field, which deal with employment in Germany and Switzerland, the diaspora in Switzerland, road transport, the “Big Brother Vip Albania” program and security issues related to the north of Kosovo, while there were no misinformation publications in the political field. Even in the “Fraud” rating category, social topics have prevailed.
During this month (March 2023), the main topics on which the media have created and distributed misinformation content are the giving of wealth, the "Big Brother Vip Albania" program, employment in Germany, Prime Minister Kurti, murder, baseless claims that Serbs are under pressure from Kosovo institutions and other topics. This month, like the previous month (February 2023), is characterized by the frequency of social topics, while there were significantly less for the north of Kosovo and the Kosovo-Serbia dialogue, although political topics are in second place immediately after social issues. Almost all misinformation about social issues is published in the Albanian language, mainly by social media and less by real media and dubious portals, while articles with political content are published by Serbian and Albanian language media. It is worth noting that the main areas of misinformation are social issues with 36%, politics much less with 16% and the black chronicle with 14%.
Real media with 45% and social media with 45% have also published the largest number of misinformation contents for this one-month monitoring period of 90% in total, while suspicious portals have published 10% of these contents. Of the real media, the vast majority of them are in the Albanian language for black chronicles and social issues mostly, as well as significantly less misinformative articles about politics. Whereas, the real media in the Serbian language have created and distributed articles only on political, security and rule of law issues related to the developments in Kosovo. As for social media, most misinformation has been distributed on Facebook at 69%, followed by TikTok with 25%, as well as Twitter and Reddit with 3% each. Almost all publications on social media are in the Albanian language, in which misinformation about social topics predominates, followed by showbiz, politics, security and weather. According to the monitoring, 81% of the publications were published by the media in the Albanian language, 16% by those in the Serbian language and 2% by the media in other languages (English and Russian).
The most talked about institution, during the month of March 2023, is the Kosovo Police by the media in the Serbian language, in their false claims that the Serbian citizens in Kosovo are under pressure and threats from the Kosovo Police. Among the personalities, even this month, Prime Minister Albin Kurti is the most talked about political and security issues by the Albanian and Serbian language media.