Having worked in comms for over 20 years, I've been fascinated by the concept of trust and its evolving interpretation. We only need to look at recent political scandals; be it Covid parties or MP expenses, to illustrate how truth’s manipulation can have massive consequences on trust and impact the perception of people and organisations.
In its Global Risk Report, the World Economic Forum identifies misinformation as the biggest threat to businesses today and demonstrates why trust has never been more important.
At Antidote, we define it as the spread of information that is unintentionally false, inaccurate or misleading. Unlike disinformation which is where intentionally inaccurate information is spread with malicious intent. Misinformation is not driven by deliberate deceit or intent.
Technology: fear or driver?
Awareness of misinformation has more than doubled since 2019, but why has this culture been created? Fear? Opportunity? Polarisation? The rise of GenAI brings a fear of the unknown, similar to the fear spread after the invention of the printing press, which sparked concern about independent thinking and new ideas. However, the printing press led to a flourishing era of content creation, the birth of newspapers, and a shift in consumer habits. Taking this historical context, while new technologies can incite fear, they also have the propensity to drive innovation and change.
Up to fairly recently, traditional media had the time and space to verify and check information and ensure it was correct. Fast forward to today - social media has enabled us all to be content creators, GenZ’s social currency and validation is the ‘like’ button and our desire for human connection is satisfied by digital sharing which is unchecked and often unregulated. Misinformation has never been more prevalent.
The advent of AI only amplifies this mode. Large language models such as ChatGPT are human amplifiers. They are only as good as the data which feeds into them. This is why they are racially and sexually biased - they are a reflection of the world in which they exist. (fyi, a great read in this area is Invisible Women by Caroline Criado Perez.) Unless the input is correct, GenAI allows for misinformation to be shared at scale.
The impact of misinformation on businesses
This wave of change could potentially kill a business overnight. Appearing to associate, even accidentally, with false content can lead to significant reputational damage, with 63% of consumers agreeing that misinformation has a negative impact on their perception of brands. This reputational damage can also impact a brand's bottom line, with 50% of consumers admitting they are less likely to purchase from a brand that appears to support misinformation.
It’s something that is clearly keeping business leaders up at night, with more than half stating the effects of misinformation are likely to be worse in 20 years than they are now and with an estimated $78 billion lost each year to misinformation, the issue is not going away.
For businesses today, the focus is on brand surveillance. Misinformation is monitored and where needed swift action is taken to correct it. Yet with false news reaching more people than the truth (the top 1% of false news cascades to between 1000 and 100,000 people, whereas the truth rarely is diffused to more than 1000 people), businesses need to switch their approach to brand safety.
This is done partly by building a strong brand reputation for being trustworthy and transparent so that the public is more likely to trust information from that source. However, with the rise of Gen AI, how can brands ensure the information being used online is factually correct? How can businesses utilise data to engage audiences in a more engaging way?
How can PR & comms help minimise the risk of misinformation?
The PR industry acts as a custodian of information for businesses, and with exponential technological change, this has never been more of a responsibility. Our response must meet a new elevation of technological change by moving businesses from a place of brand surveillance to brand safety.
At Antidote our driving ambition is to build trust creators. In a world where trust in political institutions and democracy is on the wane, there is a fresh opportunity for businesses to become the trusted source of facts for their stakeholders - not just customers. Trust creators are leaders in providing thought-provoking insights and factually correct data for technology to utilise and share at scale. To become part of this rising sea-change, brands need to build connections amongst their stakeholders through powerful and creative data-led communication activities. In short, a brand’s best asset is its authenticity. For this approach to work, they must also protect their own reputation by opting into technology and engaging with GenAI in a positive way.
We use protect and promote communications strategies as a baseline for every client we work with. Our ability to unite data, technology and senior counsel sets us apart from both legacy PR agencies and comms tech vendors.
It is essential that businesses factor in that misinformation is here to stay. There is a need for everyone in an organisation to opt into developing their knowledge of misinformation, how it’s spread and how we find our own truths - as business leaders, employees and individuals.
If you want to find out more about how Antidote can protect and promote your businesses to minimise its risk of misinformation, get in touch today.
