The price of lies: how fake news is hurting businesses around the world
The problem of fake news is getting more and more attention. Fake news can harm not only society and politicians, butalso businesses. How do "ducks" - others and their own — affect companies and how to deal with them?
Non-illusory risk
Fake news is one of the most significant problems for Internet users around the world, and the concern caused by the dominance of false information is only growing. Although the phrase fake news appears most often in the context of politics, this is only one of the areas that they affect. Business suffers from unverified or outright false information no less. According to experts, the world’s annual economic losses from such messages are estimated at almost $ 40 billion. A special risk of fakes is that even one message can lead to devastating results.
This is exactly what happened in 2013, when a hacker attack on the official Twitter of the Associated Press news agency resulted in a tweet about an alleged attack on the White House and the wounding of US President Barack Obama. The Dow Jones index sank more than 140 points, and company shares lost more than $ 130 billion in total value. If hacks of leading news agencies have not developed into a permanent practice, this does not mean that the business has received a breather. Moreover, it is threatened not only by global, easily refuted fakes, but also by pinpoint messages, the destructive effect of which is also difficult to overestimate.
There are many examples when fake-news made a harm to company reputation, made their customers fear that their beloved brand isn’t what they thought and I think that this type of competition will only grow up in future. So, what brands can do to avoid getting in trouble with fake-news. I don’t have a certain answer, but I presume that openness with customers and sharing details on their products and operations must be the most important weapon in this situation. Brands also need to get better connected with their customers, so they are aware what the company can do and what they can’t do.
Non-illusory risk
Fake news is one of the most significant problems for Internet users around the world, and the concern caused by the dominance of false information is only growing. Although the phrase fake news appears most often in the context of politics, this is only one of the areas that they affect. Business suffers from unverified or outright false information no less. According to experts, the world’s annual economic losses from such messages are estimated at almost $ 40 billion. A special risk of fakes is that even one message can lead to devastating results.
This is exactly what happened in 2013, when a hacker attack on the official Twitter of the Associated Press news agency resulted in a tweet about an alleged attack on the White House and the wounding of US President Barack Obama. The Dow Jones index sank more than 140 points, and company shares lost more than $ 130 billion in total value. If hacks of leading news agencies have not developed into a permanent practice, this does not mean that the business has received a breather. Moreover, it is threatened not only by global, easily refuted fakes, but also by pinpoint messages, the destructive effect of which is also difficult to overestimate.
There are many examples when fake-news made a harm to company reputation, made their customers fear that their beloved brand isn’t what they thought and I think that this type of competition will only grow up in future. So, what brands can do to avoid getting in trouble with fake-news. I don’t have a certain answer, but I presume that openness with customers and sharing details on their products and operations must be the most important weapon in this situation. Brands also need to get better connected with their customers, so they are aware what the company can do and what they can’t do.