The rise on online platforms and accessibility has affected not only how people socialize but also how information is presented, accepted, and synthesized. Social media platforms have been breeding grounds of unverified and fallacious news and information spreading like wildfire. The consequences of these phenomenon extend to civic, educational, political, health, and economic spaces.
However, in the Philippines, social media corporations are left unchecked and unregulated. “[S]ocial media platforms have refrained from taking the responsibility of being the arbiters of truth and are not bound by law to monitor and be accountable for the content published in their sites.”
Media outlets and journalists are discredited and oftentimes disenfranchised while digital influencers are patronized through trolling and other coordinated online behavior. Democracy has taken a hard hit with political actors taking advantage of this dilemma to pursue propaganda and advance authoritarianism and populism. It will continue to be a challenge to freedom and democracy if left unchecked.
“Fake News” vs “Disinformation”
Fake news and disinformation have been buzz words for the last six years. While it is a global challenge, there is no one definition of the term, making it harder to craft means to address it. Western conceptualizations define disinformation as verifiably false or misleading information created, presented, and disseminated for economic gain to intentionally deceive the public which may cause harm and fake news as inexact allegations or imputations, or news that falsely report facts
UP College of Mass Communication Professor Clarissa David categorized fake news into two: (1) misinformation, which is false information unintentionally disseminated on online platforms; and (2) disinformation, which is intended to convince online users to favor a group or individual political perspective.2 Moving forward, it is vital that these terms be defined without ambiguity to not run the risk of censorship, and stifling freedom of expression in addressing the exponentially worsening problem with disinformation.
State of Disinformation in the Philippines
Disinformation has proliferated under the Duterte administration. Advertising and PR strategists have feasted on the nature of social media platforms and algorithms to “debase[] political discourse and silence[] dissidents in their vociferous sharing of fake news and amplification of hate speech.”3 Members of a keyboard army are reported to earn $10 per day operating fake social media accounts. Even seemingly innocent unverified posts or reshares can be traced back to the efforts of digital disinformation purveyors.
Unfortunately, amidst the efforts to curb the issue, there is still no enabling law punishing disinformation. Hence, the responsibility is passed on social media consumers. Media outlets, civil societies, communication experts, and truth advocates are left with the gigantic burden of fact checking and disproving fake news.
Laws on Freedom of Expression
Addressing disinformation requires the careful understanding and study of freedom of speech, of expression, or of the press, or the right of the people peaceably to assemble to ensure that no right is curtailed. Prior restrain–“official governmental restrictions on the press or other forms of expression in advance of actual publication or dissemination”4–is presumed to be invalid. More so, the guarantee of freedom of expression limits the power of the state over subsequent punishment–“the imposition of liability to the individual exercising his [or her] freedom” and may be “in any form, such as penal, civil, or administrative penalty.”
Below are some laws that may be considered as valid limitations on freedom of expression:
- Revised Penal Code of 1930
- Electronic Commerce Act of 2000
- Anti-Child Pornography Act of 2009
- Anti-Photo and Video Voyeurism Act of 2009
- Cybercrime Prevention Act of 2012
- Data Privacy Act of 2012
- Safe Spaces Act of 2018
- Anti-Terrorism Act of 2020
However, some of these laws have been weaponized to silence dissent. “The decline in internet freedom in the country occurred against the backdrop of an erosion of political and civil rights under President Duterte.”
Freedom House, a non-government organization, in their 2021 report on Freedom on Net has tagged the Philippines as only “partly free” due to the passage of the Anti-Terror Act and the continuous red tagging of journalists and civil societies critical of the administration.
Way Forward
Experts and advocates are pointing at possible legislations to regulate social media corporations to address the worsening disinformation epidemic and protect people’s right to express, to speech, and to assemble peacefully.
