As Australian heads towards the 2019 Federal Election Google is preparing the inter webs for both an increase in interest in local political issues as well as a deluge of potentially false and misleading information. It doesn’t matter which side of the swamp you’re on, we all want an honest and fair election…. that results in our side winning.
To this end Google has a two pronged strategy to try and keep this election well-informed. Firstly you can now visit a dedicated Google Trends site “Search Trends for the 2019 Australian Federal Election“. On this site you’ll see a lot of information and fancy graphics about recent search trends, interesting topics and the typical Google trends style information.
The other piece of news is the launch of an Australian bureau of First Draft, a global organisation dedicated to tackling misinformation online. In partnership with Centre for Media Transition at the University of Technology Sydney, Final Draft will work with Australian journalists and journalism students to fight misinformation online.
With many people across the globe noticing the impact online sources and social media such as Facebook and Twitter had on other elections it’s good to see Google trying to get ahead of potential misinformation.
We have already seen political parties in Australia use Facebook to spread misleading and false information in this election – unfortunately a lot of people believe what they see on Facebook. Hopefully Google’s initiative can help prevent any more of this occurring.
More importantly though, do you think Google maps will track all of the sausage sizzles again this year? Let’s hope so.
More needs to be done. This video shows how complict Facebook and others like Google are in helping spread this misinformation https://www.ted.com/talks/carole_cadwalladr_facebook_s_role_in_brexit_and_the_threat_to_democracy
Our readers are spot on so often. Preach good sir.